Cancer scandal: now 2,000 fearful women call smear test line
Minister can’t say how many died after misdiagnoses
MORE than 2,000 women who are worried their smear test results may be inaccurate and are at risk of having cancer have swamped a helpline in the wake of the CervicalCheck controversy.
The helpline had to be put in place amid mounting anxiety about the number of women who were wrongly given the all clear and developed cancer.
Health Minister Simon Harris is under increasing pressure to reveal how many women have died due to the scandal.
Vicky Phelan, who has terminal cancer after abnormalities in her test were missed in 2011, called for others in CervicalCheck to consider their positions after its clinical director Dr Gráinne Flannelly resigned at the weekend.
MORE than 2,000 women who are worried their smear test result may be inaccurate and that they are at risk of cancer have swamped a helpline in the wake of the CervicalCheck controversy.
The helpline, which ran for 16 hours during the weekend, had to be put in place amid mounting anxiety about the number of women who were wrongly given the all-clear and developed cancer.
A spokesman for CervicalCheck told the Irish Independent that it fielded 877 calls on Saturday, when it developed a temporary glitch.
Another 866 women flooded the phoneline up to 5.30pm yesterday, with a spokesman for CervicalCheck saying more than 2,000 callers had rung by the time it closed last night.
The high volume of calls came after the harrowing revelations about mother-of-two Vicky Phelan, who has terminal cervical cancer after abnormalities in her test were missed in 2011.
Another 206 women have also developed cancer after their tests were misread, and at least three have died.
CervicalCheck said last night a senior medical team spent the weekend trawling through files in the service and should know today how many more women are affected.
The women who rang the helpline were spoken to by a member of staff who took their details and promised a doctor would return the call this week.
The role of Health Minister Simon Harris and his response to the crisis is set to come under scrutiny this week as questions are raised about why he did not intervene earlier to spare Ms Phelan being put through a gruelling court ordeal before getting €2.5m in compensation.
She was not told of an inter- nal CervicalCheck report on her case for three years and was pressed in the course of the case to agree to a confidentiality clause.
The spokesman said free retests would be offered to women who were worried about their last reading and more details of who will be eligible will be available this week.
Asked how many women had died, he said: “The HSE has established a serious incident management team (SIMT) to
look at these issues and the work will need to be completed before the HSE can comment on the matter.”
The clinical director of CervicalCheck, Dr Gráinne Flannelly, stepped down on Saturday but there are unlikely to be any more resignations for now despite Mr Harris saying he did not have confidence in the management of CervicalCheck.
The spokesman said the findings of an external review of CervicalCheck will have to be heard before any decisions about management would be made.
This will “determine any learnings and opportunities for improvement within the CervicalCheck programme”.
“The HSE is confident that, in keeping with the usual principles of natural justice, the minister would expect that this peer review would be completed and appropriate procedures followed before any judgment is passed on the role of the clinical and managerial leadership of the programme.”
It emerged in the course of the court proceedings brought by Ms Phelan that Dr Colm Henry, the HSE’s national clinical adviser and group lead of acute hospitals, was told of the dispute between CervicalCheck and her medical team over who should tell her about the internal review of her case.
Dr Henry was appointed by Mr Harris last week to oversee the investigation of files in CervicalCheck which was going on over he weekend.
Asked about Dr Henry’s role in the case of Ms Phelan, the CervicalCheck spokesman said yesterday that Dr Henry “was informed last July when a discussion was taking place as to who was the appropriate clinician to talk to patients about results”. “Dr Henry facilitated a solution to the matter being discussed,” he added.
Ms Phelan told yesterday how the only people to apologise to her in the aftermath of finding out she had terminal cancer were her legal team when she first visited them to take a case against CervicalCheck.
Women who are worried about their smear test results can call the CervicalCheck helpline on 1800 454555 from 9am to 6pm daily. It says it is experiencing an “unusually large” volume of calls and will try to reply to all queries as soon as possible.