Citing confidentiality and legal opinions, health care officials are saying little about the identity of the doctor who may have conducted incomplete colonoscopies of 684 patients between 2009 and 2012, only that he left the Lakeshore General in January of this year.  

The discovery made during a recent quality control check.   It's a possibility that one out of six may have negative test results.

Gastroenterologist, Dr. Nadeem Ahmed said "the difficulty is that colon cancer could have developed in the interim regardless, that's something that we cannot say.  Our main concern is for the health of our patients and certainly our concern is to make sure that we do provide the best care to our patients as possible."

Not all of the patients will need a repeat colonoscopy if another doctor is now following them, but the Lakeshore and other hospitals say they're ready for all of them if that's the case.   And they're aiming to get all of them done in three months.

Photos: Shuyee Lee (CJAD), Andre Pichette (La Presse)