THE doctor who failed to identify cancer in 61 East Lancashire women has been formally charged with 'deficient professional performance'.

Dr Glenn Anthony Kelly will face a General Medical Council (GMC) Fitness to Practise Hearing on June 6.

If the allegations against Dr Kelly are proved he could be struck off the medical register.

One of the women affected said ‘he should never be allowed to work again’.

And solicitors representing some of the women who were misdiagnosed said the hearing could boost their fight for compensation.

A panel will meet in Manchester to consider Dr Kelly's case over an allegation of “impairment by reason of deficient professional performance”.

The GMC said the investigation would surround Dr Kelly's performance during his assessment of 17 patients between September 2006 and December 2008, while he was working as a consultant radiologist and director of the Breast Screening Unit at East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust.

A GMC spokesman said: “It is alleged that Dr Kelly incorrectly interpreted the mammograms of 16 patients, that he failed to perform ultrasound scans on 13 patients and discharged three of these patients.

“It is further alleged that Dr Kelly arranged inadequate follow up for two patients.”

Earlier this year a damning report chronicled ‘unforgivable’ blunders made by Dr Kelly.

The independent inquiry into his work at Accrington Victoria Community Hospital found the number of patients affected was far higher than had been thought.

Dr Kelly was originally said to have missed breast cancer in 17 patients, but analysis of his patients further back to 2000 found the true figure to be 61.

Six of those women have since died, two from the disease.

It is not known if their prognosis was affected by the diagnosis delays.

The independent inquiry said Dr Kelly was not ‘sufficiently competent’ to perform biopsies using ultrasound, and instead relied on outdated techniques.

However, it also said Dr Kelly was meant to have an annual appraisal, but had just three in 18 years.

In his 2005 appraisal he asked for training so he could carry out ultrasound biopsies. This request was not fulfilled.

Despite Dr Kelly being suspended by the hospital trust more than two years ago, he has still been receiving a salary of around £100,000 a year.

Because of the terms of his contract, which the trust drew up in line with Department of Health guidelines, hospital bosses cannot review his position until the hearing is over.

Dr Kelly may be handed a warning, but if the panel judges that his fitness to practise is impaired, he could be suspended temporarily or struck off the medical register permanently.

Grandmother-of-two Glenys Thompson, 59, was wrongly given the all-clear by Dr Kelly.

Her case was the first in which errors were uncovered.

It sparked the re-checking of 335 mammograms and the re-screening of 85 women.

Mrs Thompson, of Barnoldswick, said: “I think he should never be allowed to practise again and in the meantime he should be on sick pay like I am, not on a hundred grand.”

A former machinist, Mrs Thompson underwent radiotherapy while taking time off work and eventually had to give up her job.

She had an operation to have a small lump removed, which fortunately prevented the cancer spreading, but needed further surgery this year to correct the damage caused to her breast by radiation.

She said: “It's been awful because it hasn't just changed my life, it's changed the life of everybody around me.

“I've not had any compensation because the NHS said they acted within so many weeks of missing my cancer.

“My gripe was that if Dr Kelly had his way I wouldn't have gone back for another three years.”

Julianne Moore, partner at Manchester-based lawyers Pannone LLP, said she had represented 'several' of the misdiagnosed women, and that a few cases were still ongoing.

She said: “Any finding of facts is obviously welcome because it is helpful.

"But more importantly for the women involved, the feeling I get from my clients is that they want the knowledge that the profession is taking seriously the criticism of Dr Kelly.

“Hopefully in time this will bring back into focus the importance of competent breast screening and ensure that what happened at Accrington does not happen again.”

Dr Kelly could not be contacted to comment.