Negligence in Interpretation of Pap Smears

Can Advanced Cancer and Deaths be Prevented by Pap Smears?

The object of reducing the occurrence of false-negative Pap smears has been a major focus of legislative reform and of ongoing quality control programs throughout the country. Whether the 4900 annual excess deaths from cervical cancer are subject to further reduction has been questioned by some authors recently. Frabel and others focus primarily on the perceived plight of the cytotechnologist, cytopathologist or laboratory, or the assumed increased cost which would result from any significant improvement to the existing system. , DeMay argues that cytologists are being held to an impossible standard of perfection in malpractice litigation and that a zero error standard is both unreasonable and impossible to achieve in practice. The legal system does not demand perfection. The legal system does demand that cytotechnologists and cytopathologists perform in conformity with those principles of practice about which there is uniform agreement. From a legal perspective, a zero error standard is reasonable, whether or not it is possible to achieve in practice. All standards of practice must be at least theoretically obtainable. If it were theoretically impossible to perform in a certain manner in practice, such performance would not be a standard to which any professional would be held. We do not ignore in our culture the incidence of carelessness simply because it is supposed that human beings will, on occasion, be careless.

The cytopathologist can have a far-reaching role in reducing morbidity due to cervical cancer. This role is not limited to interpreting properly Pap smears submitted for review. The cytopathologist also has a responsibility to inform those submitting smears of the adequacy of the smears and to submit reports in a comprehensive and comprehensible form, together with recommendations for future management (diagnostic evaluation).

[ Back to Previous Page ] [ Continue to Page 4 of 9 ]

Skip to Page: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9]