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Saturday, December 20, 2003Filed this week by a former Magee pathologist and two women, the suits claim doctors' electronic signatures were used to mislead patients into thinking that their Pap smears were being reviewed by physicians when the doctors had never seen the tests. They're going to have a tough time proving that any damage was done by using electronic signatures. How many women actually look at their pap smear results? They usually just get a call or a card from their doctor saying all was normal, or they get a call telling them something was wrong. Very few actually look at the printed page and say, "Whew. Signed by a pathologist. Must be accurate." I've always taken it for granted that pap smears were reviewed by technicians and that pathologists only look at them if the techs find an abnormality. In fact, that is standard practice, and it isn't necessarily a matter of neglect, but of necessity. There aren't enough pathologists in the world to review every single pap smear slide done in the United States each day. The pathologistis are still accountable for the work of the technicians (they periodically review random paps for quality control.) Sounds like this is mostly the acting out of a disgruntled employee (the pathologist filing the original suit was fired from the lab) who has managed to pull along a couple of patients with her into her mad lawsuit dance. posted by Sydney on 12/20/2003 04:23:00 PM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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