The family of a woman who died from a rare and aggressive form of thyroid cancer has said she may not have suffered as much pain had her GP sent her for a scan earlier.

Christine Monahan died five months after attending her GP, Dr Pawel Kaminski, complaining of a painful throat.

Dr Kaminski accepted three allegations of poor professional performance in relation to the treatment of Ms Monahan over five visits to his surgery at the Ballyowen Lane Medical Centre in Lucan in 2015 at a hearing of the Irish Medical Council’s Fitness to Practise Committee yesterday.

The committee heard Ms Monahan (52), of Wood Avens, Clondalkin, attended his clinic with a painful throat in June 2015 and was ultimately diagnosed with anaplastic thyroid cancer and died on October 20.

Please log in or register with Independent.ie for free access to this article.

Log In

New to Independent.ie? Create an account

Dr Kaminski accepted he failed to arrange for Ms Monahan to be referred for an ultrasound or other appropriate radiological investigation as well as failing to keep an adequate medical record for follow-up action when she visited his surgery on June 11, 2015.

The GP said he could not recall the consultation but accepted he had recorded “for US” in her medical records, which indicated an intention to refer her for an ultrascan.

He said the reason he didn’t may have been because he was waiting for the transfer of medical records from her previous GP.

Dr Kaminski also accepted he had failed to refer her to an endocrinologist or prescribe appropriate medications for her condition on four subsequent visits over the next eight weeks after he had diagnosed her with an overactive thyroid.

He further acknowledged that his referral letter for Ms Monahan to the radiology department at St James’s Hospital on August 6 failed to provide adequate information about her condition to ensure the case was treated as urgent.

Independent medical expert Dr Triona Farrell said while Dr Kaminski could not have been expected to diagnose anaplastic thyroid cancer, he had failed to recognise the potential serious nature of Ms Monahan’s condition.

Dr Kaminski, who is originally from Poland, has been working as a GP in Ireland since 2012. He now works in a practice in Enniscorthy, Co Wexford.

Before giving evidence he apologised to Ms Monahan’s family for the distress his errors had caused them.

In a statement, Janice Monahan said her mother, who had Parkinson’s disease, had felt unwell after attending a Take That concert in late May 2015.

She said her mother had attended Dr Kaminski after her pain increased and she began losing weight.

She returned a number of times to the GP as she was in agony and had become ashamed about going out in public because of the size of the lump on her neck.

Ms Monahan said her family were never told by the GP their mother could have cancer.

“If the GP had sent her for a scan earlier she may not have suffered as much pain,” she said.

Ms Monahan said they did not want Dr Kaminski to lose everything but also felt he should not be allowed to make the same mistake again.

The committee did not disclose the sanctions it has proposed to the Medical Council.

Source: Read Full Article