Dr. Rajgopal Menon lost a legal bid to have the Court of Appeal examine the certification process for a class-action lawsuit being launched against the former pathologist. (CBC)

A New Brunswick Court of Appeal judge has rejected a legal challenge by disgraced pathologist Dr. Rajgopal Menon to block a class-action suit brought against him by former patients.

Menon had asked the province's top court to hear arguments over the certification process of the class-action lawsuit against him. That would have delayed the suit while Menon's challenge was heard.

Court of Appeal Justice J.C. Marc Richard wrote in his decision that the certification process should continue and not be bogged down by expensive appeals to the top court.

"The best way to secure the just, least expensive and most expeditious determination of the certification process on its merits is to allow it to proceed, and for the parties to be allowed to apply for leave to appeal and then raise, at the same time, any alleged errors, once the decision has been made," Richard wrote in the ruling.

The top court heard arguments in Menon's appeal on May 17 and the decision was handed down June 22.

Approximately 100 former patients of Menon have signed up for the class-action lawsuit.

Public inquiry

Menon worked as a pathologist at the Miramichi Regional Health Authority from 1995 until February 2007, when he was suspended after complaints about incomplete diagnoses and delayed lab results.

Former health minister Michael Murphy called a formal public inquiry into the pathology work at the Miramichi hospital after an independent audit of 227 cases of breast and prostate cancer biopsies from 2004-05 found 18 per cent had incomplete results and three per cent had been misdiagnosed.

Justice Paul Creaghan found that Menon should have been fired two years before he was suspended.

Creaghan's final report offered 52 recommendations to improve pathology services in the province.