Nearly 40 Quebec women with breast cancer did not receive the proper treatment -- and five of them died -- after receiving the results of poorly done pathology tests, a new review has revealed.
The review was requested by Quebec health minister Yves Bolduc after Quebec's association of pathologists released an alarming report back in May, citing problems with the province's hormone receptor testing.
HER2, estrogen and progesterone hormone receptor tests are done to determine breast cancer type and the appropriate course of chemotherapy treatment.
After similar hormone receptor tests were botched in Newfoundland and Labrador, Dr. Louis Gaboury, head of the Quebec Association of Pathologists, worried that the same problems might be happening in his province. So his group re-examined almost 3,000 hormone receptor tests conducted over 14 months, starting in April 2008.
That study found 87 errors among the test results.
The new provincial study, ordered in June and released today, had a lab in Washington state re-review 2,100 of the tests. It confirms that 39 of the patients involved failed to receive the proper care. As well, five patients died after not receiving appropriate care.
Bolduc said there was no proof the five deaths were caused by not receiving proper treatment.
The health minister also noted that the error rate the review found fell well below what he described as "the 10-per-cent norm" for such screening.
"Our laboratories are of a very high quality," the minister said. "Our results in pathology, in Quebec, are world-class."
Quebec's College of Physicians said it was satisfied with the government's handling of the issue.
At least one lawsuit from one of the women involved has already been filed in Quebec.
