HSE downplays skin cancer backlog fears

The HSE has downplayed fears that skin cancer patients were caught up in the administrative debacle that kept GPs in the South-East in the dark about how patients were faring.

A backlog of more than 3,000 letters — which had been dictated but not typed up — did not delay treatment for urgent cases such as patients with skin cancer, according to Richard Dooley, hospital network manager for the South-East hospital group.

Last week, GPs received a letter from one of two dermatologists working in the dermatology service at Waterford Regional Hospital saying that the department was at crisis point and a critical incident was waiting to happen.