The lack of a national screening programme is still the main reason for cervical cancer deaths, writes Eithne Donnellan, Health Correspondent.
The revelation that another young woman has died of cervical cancer after those analysing smear tests allegedly failed to identify her condition until it was too late is worrying.
Last month Janet Donnelly (38) from Cabra, Dublin, died, just weeks after she received €500,000 in damages in settlement of her claim that doctors incorrectly interpreted her cervical smear test.
She had a smear test in June 1999, which was reported as negative in an analysis by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI).
Just eight months later she was found to have an invasive type of carcinoma of the cervix which had not been detected. The RCSI admitted liability.
Yesterday the High Court heard that another young mother, Anne "Lulu" Broderick (30) from Shankill in Dublin, who died in 1998, had undergone three smear tests between between 1989 and 1993 but she was either not told of abnormalities which were present or else they were not detected.
Her family's action against the Coombe Women's Hospital and a hospital in the UK where she had her smear tests carried out was settled for some €325,000.
Her first smear test at the Coombe was carried out in 1993 and last evening a spokesman for the hospital said cervical cytological procedures followed in the Coombe at that time "were in accordance with internationally accepted best practice".
Nonetheless, the hospital said it "recognises the tragic consequences of this case for the late Mrs Broderick and her family".
The hospital spokesman added that since 1995, in accordance with new guidelines, all smears at the hospital are analysed twice to ensure the small number of "false negative" results found on initial examination are picked up.
Dr Gráinne Flannelly, a consultant gynaecologist on the medical committee of the Irish Cancer Society, said it was tragic when anyone died from cervical cancer.
She said the biggest reason why people died from this cancer in this country every year was not because their smear tests were incorrectly interpreted but because they were not screened at all, in the absence of a national cervical screening programme. One was urgently required.
"An organised programme is the only proven way of reducing cervical cancer . . . screening has been found to prevent up to 90 per cent of cases of cervical cancer," she added.
Around 70 young women, their average age 45, die from cervical cancer in the Republic every year.
Dr Marian O'Reilly, who is in charge of a pilot screening programme operating successfully in the mid-west for the past five years, has said up to 60 lives could be saved per year if a national screening programme were introduced.
The Government must immediately set a deadline for the start of such a programme, she said.