HIV or hepatitis because instruments were not sterilised

Queensland Health has apologised to the patients who could have been exposed to HIV or hepatitis because instruments were not sterilised.

Queensland chief health officer Dr Jeannette Young says it was an unfortunate mistake that could have happened at any hospital.

"I do apologise to those people, as I know all the staff involved in the clinic - it is an anxious time for them," he said.

"All I can try and do is reassure them - we do have staff ringing and and explaining the whole situation."

Dr Young says there is a very low risk that those dental patients at the Bundaberg hospital have been exposed to HIV or hepatitis.

"This is an unfortunate incident that could actually have happened anywhere," she said.

"It's an error that's occurred and it's something that we'll look at very very carefully to see how we could prevent it happening anywhere - it's just a very unfortunate error."

Urgent review

Queensland Health says independent infection control experts will fly to Bundaberg Hospital today to help with an urgent review of procedures.

The chief executive officer for the Sunshine-Wide Bay health region, Kevin Hegarty, says the review will cover human error and patient safety.

"We treat this very seriously and any action that is highlighted through this ... analysis, any required action to improve our process or whatever action they come up with - I'll be considering that tonight and putting that into place without any hesitation," he said.

Opposition MP Rob Messenger has called for counselling and private dental treatment for those Bundaberg patients potentially exposed to HIV.

Mr Messenger says some of the patients want the remainder of their dental work done at a private clinic.

"There's been a shattering of trust - they are also in need of a counselling service," he said.

But Wide-Bay Health Service spokesman Dr David Sowden says there is only a risk if one of the earlier patients had already been infected.

He says even then, the chances of the infection being passed on are remote.

"When you clean instruments and decontaminate them, that removes a lot of the infectivity, but that final step of sterilisation is needed to eliminate any infectivity," he said.