Georgetown University Hospital has temporarily closed a lab that performs genetic analysis for cancer after the results of flawed tests incorrectly showed that two patients did not have breast cancer, the Washington Post reports.
The two patients were later contacted and told that they did, in fact, have a particularly aggressive form of breast cancer. In addition, 249 women's tissue samples were independently retested, the newspaper reports.
The flawed tests took place between May 2009 and April 2010. A few months earlier, Georgetown's Molecular Diagnostics Laboratory failed a quality-control assessment of its HER2 testing when surveyors found that lab staff were using improper temperatures, timing and tissue-embedding methods when processing samples.
Georgetown CMO Stephen Evans says the hospital has since taken steps to ensure the quality and accuracy of testing, including by suspending work at the lab and sending tests to outside labs, the Post reports. The lab has also conducted an internal investigation, passed two later quality-control tests, and performed retesting.
To learn more:
- here's the Washington Post story
- read this Wall Street Journal article about incorrect cancer tests