Four-week wait for smear test results

FOUR weeks is now the average length of time it takes to process cervical smear tests since the Health Service Executive (HSE) started using a laboratory in the United States to clear a backlog earlier this year.

In January, the assistant national director of the HSE’s National Hospital Office Tom Finn, described the decision to send cervical smears to the US as “an appropriate solution to an unacceptable problem”.

When the move was made to clear a backlog of tens of thousands of cervical smears, the average time for a test to be analysed was four months. However, some women were having to wait up to nine months for a test result.

Mr Finn also announced in January he was intent on getting waiting times for test results down to four weeks as quickly as possible and keeping them within that timeframe.

To date, a total of 37,000 smear tests have been sent to a laboratory in the US to be tested, resulting in the HSE achieving the target turnaround time of four weeks in June.

The health authority plans to continue using the laboratory on the basis of need to ensure the four-week target continues to be met.

Mr Finn said the tests were sent to the US because no similar facility in the EU could cope with the volume of tests. He said the problem had arisen in getting trained staff in Ireland.

Ireland has one of the highest rates of cervical cancer in western Europe, with 180 cases diagnosed and more than 70 deaths every year.

The Irish Cancer Society (ICS) has been campaigning for years for a national screening programme, which is due to be rolled out in early 2008.

The screening programme only operates in Limerick, Clare and Tipperary.

An ICS spokeswoman said the society was delighted with the action taken by the HSE to reduce the waiting time for test results.

The spokeswoman said the society had not received any complaints about the time taken to process smear tests since the start of the summer.

“Things are really moving in the right direction now,” she said.

In Britain and Australia where national screening programmes have been operating for 15 years, the average waiting time is about six weeks.

The spokeswoman added the ICS was also very positive about the progress being made in the national roll out of the cervical screening programme and did not anticipate that it would fall behind schedule.

Under the programme women aged 25 to 44 are screened every three years and women aged 45 to 60 every five years.

When the screening programme is available nationally, however, smear tests may continue to be analysed abroad. A procurement process is underway to contract the screening services.