REBECCA O’MALLEY, who was wrongly diagnosed as being clear of breast cancer, has called on the chief executive of the Health Service Executive (HSE) Prof Brendan Drumm to “reflect on his position”.
Ms O’Malley yesterday said that since her case came to public attention she had refrained from “calling for heads on plates”.
However, she told TV3’s The Political Party that she was so angered and upset by Prof Drumm’s reaction to the report into her case that she wrote to the chief executive earlier this month asking him to consider whether he was the person who could “lift the HSE from its present morass”.
When it emerged that Ms O’Malley had been wrongly given the all-clear in 2005, the case led to a national outcry and prompted an inquiry by the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA).
When the report was published on April 4th, Prof Drumm said in an interview with RTÉ that Ms O’Malley could have been dealt with in a much better way in terms of how she was communicated with.
He continued: “At least, on the safety side, the good news was that the pathologist in Cork whose work was reviewed, missed one diagnosis out of a huge number which, I suggest by any international standards, is a tremendous track record from the perspective of patient safety.”
Ms O’Malley said she was upset by that response. In her letter to Prof Drumm she said. “I wonder whether you have any understanding of how I felt when I heard you speaking those words directly to the camera? It was shameful propaganda and PR ‘spin’ which ignored the true reality and important conclusions of HIQA’s groundbreaking report.”
She said Prof Drumm had not yet responded to her letter, other than an e-mail acknowledgement.
