Trusts are carrying out harm reviews after a ‘contamination issue’ affecting hundreds of samples resulted in some staff and patients being wrongly told they had coronavirus, HSJ can reveal.
The error happened in mid-October and involved swabs from five trusts in the South East region, which were being processed by the NHS-run Berkshire and Surrey Pathology Services.
HSJ understands it is thought that around 100 people across several trusts were given false positive results, and subsequently tested negative.
The trusts involved are the Royal Surrey Foundation Trust, Frimley Health Foundation Trust, Royal Berkshire Foundation Trust, Ashford and St Peter’s Hospitals Foundation Trust and Berkshire Healthcare Foundation Trust.
Frimley has completed a clinical review and found no harm had been caused, while Royal Berkshire, Ashford and St Peter’s and the Royal Surrey have reviews ongoing. The position for Berkshire Healthcare, a mental health trust, is not known.
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Source: HSJ, 2 December 2020
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