Patients at risk after Allan Spigelman testing, St Vincent’s review finds

More than 500 issues have been discovered with the work carried out by a leading cancer genetic specialist, including 20 cases where patients faced potential risk.

Allan Spigelman made mistakes with genetic cancer testing, a review by St Vincent’s has found.

A distinguished clinician has had more than 500 issues discovered with his work testing patients for their genetic cancer risk at a Sydney hospital, including 20 errors which involved some people being told the wrong results.

That included one patient suffering an “adverse health outcome” as a result of information they received from Allan Spigelman, a leading cancer genetic specialist and emeritus professor at UNSW who continues to work in the public system in the Hunter region and at Maitland Private Hospital.

The poor or incorrect advice was given to patients who undertook genetic testing to see if they had an increased risk of developing certain cancers at St Vincent’s Hospital Sydney between April 2022 and June 2023.

It was not to detect whether cancer was present.

St Vincent’s Hospital Sydney first discovered three medical irregularities in September 2023 relating to patients who saw Professor Spigelman.

This sparked a formal “lookback” review across more than 1640 medical records.

It found in about 520 records there were problems such as poor clinical documentation, incomplete correspondence and lack of genetic counselling.

In about 20 of those cases there were errors that St Vincent’s said carried “potential risk”.

This masthead understands this included cases where people were told they had returned a negative result for mutations, like BRCA genes, when they were in fact positive, or vice versa.

It is also understood to have involved people being told they had a full cancer genetic test when only a partial one was carried out.

Out of that number one person had an “adverse clinical outcome” because of the incorrect advice.

St Vincent's is carrying out a review.

St Vincent’s said this person had been “informed” and support was ongoing for them.

For about 1100 patients in the review, no errors or irregularities were detected in their records.

St Vincent’s said it had contacted the 520 patients who had issues with their cases “to inform them of what had happened, to apologise and provide follow up support as needed”.

“St Vincent’s has been contacting the broader group of patients to inform them of the lookback, and apologise for any inconvenience and stress caused by the review or its outcomes,” a spokesman said.

“St Vincent’s is offering further advice and consultation to patients as required.”

Professor Spigelman had stopped working at St Vincent’s before the mistakes were first discovered.

His wife told this masthead he was “unavailable” to comment on the matter.

It is understood that he started working on his own during Covid and didn’t have a genetic counsellor with him, as is the best practice approach.

He is the brother of former NSW chief justice James Spigelman.

St Vincent’s first reported the matter to NSW Health in October 2023 – shortly after becoming aware of the irregularities.

It has provided regular updates on developments to NSW Health since then.

It also reported the matter to the NSW Health Care Complaints Commission.

“NSW Health is following appropriate policies to ensure there is no health and safety risk to the members of the public,” a spokeswoman said.

“The clinician maintains a role at Hunter New England Local Health District as a part-time staff specialist and part-time Director of the Hunter Family Cancer Genetics Service, supporting outpatient cancer clinics at Waratah and Maitland.”

The spokeswoman said they carried out a review which found there was no risk to patients.

“The clinician has previously provided a consultation service from Central Coast Local Health District premises. This is no longer the case,” she said.

“NSW Health conducted the required appointment and recruitment checks prior to the clinician commencing roles with NSW Health.”

A spokesman for Health Minister Ryan Park said: “The revelations from St Vincent’s are very concerning and will be treated with the utmost seriousness.”

“NSW Health is following appropriate policies to ensure there is no health and safety risk to the members of the public,” he said.

A UNSW spokeswoman said Professor Spigelman was not a current staff member at UNSW Sydney.

“The University has been made aware of potential issues related to Professor Spigelman’s clinical work at St Vincent’s Hospital,” she said.

“The investigation by the hospital does not involve his research or academic work while at UNSW.

“The University has not received any complaints related to his academic work.”

The HCCC said it was unable to confirm or deny if he had been the subject of a complaint.