Patients, advocates eagerly await breast cancer inquiry report

The pending report of a judicial commission that studied how hundreds of Newfoundland and Labrador breast cancer patients were handed wrong results of important lab tests is expected to lead to dramatic improvements, an advocate said Thursday.

Justice Margaret Cameron will send her final report on hormone receptor tests to government officials on Saturday. Health Minister Ross Wiseman said government will release the report publicly on Monday.

Peter Dawe, executive director of the Canadian Cancer Society, applauded government's move to release the report as soon as possible, calling it "absolutely the right thing to do. Too many people want to know what's in it."

Between last March and October, Cameron heard from dozens of witnesses on how almost 400 breast cancer patients received the wrong results on hormone receptor tests, which help determine whether a patient can benefit from antihormonal therapy, primarily Tamoxifen. For some patients, Tamoxifen can improve odds of survival.

In an interview Thursday, Dawe said patients want to read Cameron's findings, and then hear government's response.

"People have a lot of trust that this process is going to lead to something," Dawe told CBC News, adding he's personally optimistic about Cameron's report.

"If it doesn't, then I'll pack it in and go home, because this is as bright a spotlight as you can put on any one issue."

Dawe added that while some of the patients who have contacted the cancer society have been optimistic, there has also been "a certain level of nervousness … There's certainly a lot of concern that [the report] should get out in the public as soon as possible."

Cameron, who has never spoken in public about her work, other than comments she has made from the bench at the inquiry, will not be doing interviews about her findings.

Norman White, the only male breast cancer patient to testify at the Cameron inquiry, told CBC News he is still worried about what government officials might do with the report before it becomes public.

"We might not be getting all of the report as it was written because sometimes they want things altered or deleted," White said.

White, who underwent surgery to remove his left breast before learning that the procedure was not necessary, said the evidence presented at the inquiry has destroyed his faith and confidence in health officials.

Inadequate training cited in testimony

Cameron heard plenty during seven months of testimony, including about inadequate training at the pathology lab in St. John's, poor supervision and warnings about quality problems that often went unheeded.

She also heard that Eastern Health officials decided not to reveal much about the lab problems when they learned of the errors in 2005, and then withheld critical information after samples had been retested.

Last March, on the eve of the launch of the inquiry, government revealed that 108 patients who had received the wrong results had died. It is impossible to know whether those outcomes would have differed if they had received accurate test results.

The wrong results were produced between 1997 and 2005.

Ken McDonald, whose wife Christine died of cancer that started in her breast and then spread to her bones and brain, said it was only years after her death in 2000 that he was told she might have had a better chance with a different treatment.

McDonald told CBC News the critical test will be what government does with Cameron's report.  

"My biggest fear is that like many government reports, any recommendations or anything contained in it, ends up sitting on some shelf gathering dust instead of being acted on," he said.