Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 23 May 2018
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health
Cancer Screening Programmes: Discussion
9:00 am
Dr. Helen Lambkin:
That is no problem. What I am quoting is the Dáil debate of 29 May 2008. Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh said: "Quest has won the tender to analyse 300,000 Irish smear tests a year, but consultant pathologists [which are medical histopathologists] from the Coombe Women's Hospital, St. James's Hospital and St. Luke's Hospital in Dublin, and University College Hospital in Galway stated that missed cases would arise because the diagnostic rate of pre-cancerous cells at Quest Diagnostics in the US is 30% less than that of Irish laboratories."