Trust to decide how far back to review unnecessary breast cancer surgeries

A health trust will decide how far back to review breast cancer cases after more than 30 women were found to have undergone unnecessary surgery.

It has already been established that hundreds of patients came to harm during treatment at the breast unit at County Durham and Darlington Foundation Trust (CDDFT).

The trust has apologised and is using specialists from other hospitals to review cases to see if other women underwent unnecessary operations or received otherwise poor care.

 

An extraordinary trust board meeting in Durham will consider the scope of its Look Back Exercise.

Board papers recommend reviewing cases as far back as 2015, working backwards one year at a time.

Documents estimate that this could take five years and involve reviewing the care of approximately 4,500 patients.

Members of the Pink Justice Network, an online support group for women who have received breast cancer treatment from the trust, will attend the meeting.

Nadeen Lister, who runs the group of around 150 women with Amelia Green, said members were calling for a public inquiry into what went wrong.

Lister told the Press Association: “When we started the group, nobody was talking about compensation, they just wanted justice for what has been done.

“The Look Back Exercise has cost the trust more than £500,000 this year, with staff checking back over records, medical experts reviewing cases and psychological help offered to patients affected.”

Green said the trust could avoid the expense of the exercise “by backing our call for a public inquiry”.

Hayley Collinson, of Hudgell Solicitors, which represents many affected patients, said: “Given the scale of harm revealed so far, we can’t see how the Trust board can come to any other decision than to extend this lookback investigation given the findings of the first batch of cases to have been reviewed, and the high percentage of harm being identified.

“The reality is that any woman who had breast cancer treatment at this Trust from 2015 onwards is now going to be questioning whether their treatment was appropriate and if they were actually harmed.”