Councillors fear the full human cost from failings of a dermatology service may not be fully understood until a harm review is completed.

Kent and Medway Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) is currently scrutinising the actions of DMC Healthcare.

The south London-based company had responsibility for treating skin disorders across north Kent for a year-and-a-half before it was taken away from them.

There was a backlog involving patients who required urgent attention – including those for the diagnosis and treatment of cancer.

The CCG has previously apologised for the delays which "exposed people to the risk of harm".

DMC's contract for its management of nine surgeries in Medway were also terminated earlier this year after damning Care Quality Commission reports.

Managers from the CCG – the body which plans and buys healthcare services in the county – were grilled by Medway councillors during a virtual meeting of the health and adult social care overview and scrutiny committee on Thursday.

Vice chairman Cllr Wendy Purdy (Con) said: "I feel very concerned there have been people who have slipped through the net and probably, we won't know about that until two years' time what the consequences are for them.

"The CCG is a powerful body and you handle a great deal of money, you should be able to deliver the right services for the people of Kent and Medway."

Councillors were presented with the findings of a "lessons learned" report, which outlined a number of procurement and contract issues.

The full review of dermatology services is likely to take up to two years to complete, while the outcome of the review into primary care – which covers GP surgeries – is likely to be completed next month.

It was explained how any dermatology patients who needed to be seen within two weeks due to a potential cancer diagnosis have now been seen and treatment had started.

GPs in the area were written to asking them to re-refer those patients who had previously been assigned to DMC Healthcare if they were worried about them.

A helpline was also established for patients

CCG chief nurse Paula Wilkins said: "What the harm review process will do is see if the delay had any impact on their condition worsening.

"We have done everything we can to make sure that nobody's fallen through the net that we don't know about.

"The other piece of work we will be doing is looking at any patient who died whilst they were on a waiting list.

"Obviously, they may have died of something totally unrelated to their dermatology condition, but we will be including those into the harm review as well."

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