A senior pathologist at a St. John's lab says no one officially told him that breast cancer testing problems had been uncovered at Eastern Health.

Dr. Dan Fontaine testified Thursday at the commission of inquiry on hormone receptor testing, headed by Supreme Court Justice Margaret Cameron.

'People were a bit concerned by the fact that it identified issues that could've been related to practice.'—Dr. Dan Fontaine, senior pathologist

The public inquiry, being held in St. John's, is investigating how hundreds of breast cancer patients received faulty hormone receptor tests, meant to determine an appropriate course of treatment, between 1997 and 2005.

The inquiry has heard testimony that senior management at Eastern Health, the province's largest health authority, realized there was a testing problem in the summer of 2005.

But Fontaine said no one told him officially that the lab had uncovered a major problem with mistakes on breast cancer tests.

"I'd heard some grumblings," Fontaine said. "But again, there was always this rumor mill."

Fontaine said that rumour mill churned out the idea that the mistakes may have been due to new machinery installed in 2004.

Management called in outside consultants to review the lab work in May 2005. Fontaine testified it wasn't until a couple of months later that pathologists were told what was going on — that there were many problems in the lab, leading to faulty test results.

'More silence'

Inquiry lawyer Bern Coffey asked Fontaine about what the doctors were told.

"People were a bit concerned by the fact that it identified issues that could've been related to practice," Fontaine testified.

"And what did they say about it, do you recall?" Coffey asked.

"There was more silence, I guess, after the discussion," Fontaine said.

A short time later, Fontaine resigned his senior position, but stayed on as a pathologist with Eastern Health.

In April 2008, Fontaine publicly resigned from the health authority altogether, making him the third pathologist to leave the health authority one month after the inquiry began to uncover the extent of the stress on the doctors and technologists in the labs.

In May, the government of Newfoundland and Labrador announced a new offer to pathologists includes a $73,000 wage increase, a stipend of $60,000, compensation for being on call, a retention bonus and other benefits.

After a personal plea from Premier Danny Williams, Fontaine withdrew his resignation.