Govt criticised for lack of progress since Gisborne inquiry

4:00 pm - By MONIQUE DEVEREUX

The British pathologist independently reviewing the Gisborne cervical cancer inquiry today told the Health Minister she had "serious concerns" about the lack of progress since the inquiry ended seven months ago.

Dr Euphemia McGoogan is in New Zealand to review the progress of the inquiry. She and Health Minister Annette King spoke to a public meeting in Gisborne today, attended by about 40 people.

Dr McGoogan is due to make a full report to Health Minister Annette King next month. But at the meeting, where the ministers and officials involved in implementing the recommendations from the inquiry were updating women on their progress, Dr McGoogan gave an indication of her preliminary findings and said there was a lot more work to be done.

In particular she said the delay in starting a crucial audit of the national cervical screening programme was not acceptable.

When the inquiry report was released on April 10, it recommended the audit needed to be completed within six months.

At the time however Mrs King said the audit would not realistically be completed for 18 months.

But that time frame has again been extended by two months and the audit will now not be completed until October next year.

Dr McGoogan also criticised the lack of availablity of the official inquiry report which had been specifically written in "every day language" so women could understand and use the information.

The official report pointed the finger at the Ministry of Health for running a deficient national screening programme that allowed Dr Michael Bottrill to misread thousands of smears.

The report, written by a three-women panel after a 12-week inquiry last year, criticised the ministry for failing to carry out a national evaluation of its cervical screening programme.

The report said that if the ministry had carried out such an evaluation, it would have been discovered that there was severe under-reporting in Gisborne.

"That knowledge should have lead to women receiving treatment earlier on and it may have avoided cancer mortality or severely invasive treatment of cancer," the report said.