Developments in Brief : Detectives Seek Patients in Test Results Mix-up

British health authorities have hired private detectives to conduct a worldwide search to trace nearly 500 women, including some now in the United States, who may be in danger of developing cancer after getting erroneous test results in a mix-up at a Liverpool hospital.

The problem was revealed last week when a consultant at the Women’s Hospital in Liverpool cast doubts on results of cervical smear tests conducted there between March, 1983, and December, 1985. As a result, about 45,000 case histories were reviewed, and hospital authorities decided that almost 1,000 women needed further tests because the original tests were faulty.

So far, only half of the patients have been located, some of whom were found to have developed cancer.

The other half are living in the United States, Oman, Australia, Nigeria, Germany and Sicily.

Hospital General Manager Pearse Butler, in charge of the operation, said the decision to employ detectives was “an extreme step, but justifiable. Some women were students and where we couldn’t trace them, we spoke to the parents. But it was very sensitive. We couldn’t say why we wanted to contact their daughters because of patients’ confidentiality.”