Hi Sarah ,
                 Russ And Emma covered most of the points in this case.It
seems that  there where concerns about this pathologist from about 1995
onwards where he was a locum at Royal United Bath Hospital .An internal
audit  was  carried out from 1995 to 1997at which point another consultant
raised concerns with other hospital trusts and then the GMC where an
investigation of his locum work in other hospitals was reviewed from march
1999.It has taken to this time for the results of the investigation where
disclosed .Unfortunately the checks on all histopathology was not as
comprehensive then as it is now.Now a problem with a pathologist would be
identified as they take part in internal and external audits/Quality
Assurance schemes and we have to do Accreditation here as well now.

As Russ said there is a shortage of Pathologists so you get employment of
retired Pathologists a lot of who may not have kept themselves up to date
with many of the advances in Histopathology/Cytopathology .It is not only a
shortage of Pathologists that is the problem here as there is a shortage of
histotechs due to the poor pay and working conditions where you are expected
to do the work of 2 just to keep up with the work flow.Most biomedical
Scientists favour clinical chem/haematology due to the high calls which they
get.For my sins I enjoy histopath as we in Northern Ireland tend to do the
bulk of grossing specimens .We don't get the recognition for it as the Royal
College of Pathologists and CPA don't accept we can do it.Hopefully things
will change as some Biomedical Scientists here have been grossing specimens
before their Pathologist got out of Med School.
Anyway thats my pennies worth

Ian Clarke
Histopathology/Cytopathology Department
CAH
UK