An independent review of breast cancer care at Barringtons' private hospital in Limerick has found that in two cases women experienced serious delays in their breast cancer diagnosis, potentially causing them harm.
The report, which will be published tomorrow, reviewed the cases of some 285 women who were treated by the hospital’s breast cancer services between September 2003 and August 2007.
It found that in 118 cases women received "inappropriate clinical care". Patients were not always x-rayed before surgical biopsy and other patients had lumps removed unnecessarily, the report found.
The review team, headed by Dr Henrietta Campbell, former chief medical officer for Northern Ireland, concluded the care provided to these women "did not meet the standards which would have been acceptable at their time of treatment".
In one instance, a 51-year-old woman had her breast cancer diagnosis delayed by 18 months when her biopsy specimens were wrongly analysed twice by laboratory staff at Galway’s University College Hospital where they had been sent by Barringtons'.
The report noted that the woman’s diagnosis had been picked up before its review began. A second woman had her diagnosis delayed after Barringtons' failed to spot a tumour in a mammogram in 2003.
The tumour was later identified by staff at the hospital when they did another mammogram in 2004. The review found no new cases of cancer diagnosis delays during the course of its investigation.
But Dr Campell said: "This level of inappropriate care is a serious concern and should not occur in any health service provided in the country."
Minister for Health Mary Harney said: "This report again highlights the need for continued implementation, in both the public and private healthcare sectors, of the National Quality Assurance Standards for Symptomatic Breast Disease Services which were approved by me last year under the Health Act 2007.
"The implementation of the Standards will ensure that every woman in Ireland who develops breast cancer has an equal opportunity to be managed in a centre which is capable of delivering the best possible results," she said.
Labour’s health spokeswoman Jan O’Sullivan said: "While the numbers involved may be fewer than in other recent cases, this will be no comfort to two women who had to endure what the report describes as ‘a significant and avoidable delay’ in diagnosing their cancer, or to the 120 women in whose cases the care given was not appropriate."
" The reports on the various cancer failures, now coming out, one by one, paint a picture of shocking inadequacies and of failure of women who were entitled to expect better from our health system," she said.
