The retinopathy screening results of more than 3,500 diabetic patients are under review after inspectors questioned the low detection rates of Colchester and Tendring’s programme, it was revealed this week.

Health officials opted to halt the service which is funded by NHS North East Essex in July last year. The health body claims that the closure was due to improvements being made and advised anyone concerned to visit their optician or GP.

However, a spokesman for NHS North East Essex, Peter Richardson, confirmed to OT today (January 26) that 3,800 images had currently been reviewed.

Wendy Tankard, director of Clinical Quality at NHS North East Essex, admitted: “No screening is 100% accurate. We are, however, reviewing a significant number of images to reassure ourselves that they have been handled correctly."

Ms Tankard explained: “When we had our service assessment in July 2009, the National Screening Team came up with a number of suggestions about how the service could be changed to make it of a higher standard.

“We took the decision to suspend screening so that we could make the changes and reassure ourselves that the service running up until then had been of a suitable standard.”

The programme is expected to be restarted at the end of February and patients will shortly receive a letter inviting them to be screened.

Ms Tankard added: “We want to be absolutely certain that the service is the best it can be, rather than rushing to restart. Although it may seem a frustratingly long time to patients, the team has been working flat out to make sure that the recommendations are looked at thoroughly to get the best service possible back online.”

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Mike Fithyan
February 2nd, 2010
Is it possible to view an audit of how well the local scheme in a particular area (i.e my own area) is operating?

Stewart Mitchell
January 30th, 2010
This is the third diabetic screening programme that I am aware of that us having issues with screening. I wonder how many more screening schemes are struggling to cope? A general comment to "visit an optician" suggests the trust is trying to force optometrist to do something more than an NHS exam.