Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he is taking to improve outcomes for people with cancer.

To help diagnose cancer earlier, we have invested over £22 million in Be Clear on Cancer campaigns between 2010-11 and 2014-15. The first national lung cancer campaign alone led to 700 extra diagnoses and 300 more surgeries during the time of the campaign. NHS England has launched a major early diagnosis programme (Accelerate, Co-ordinate, Evaluate – ACE), working jointly with Cancer Research UK and Macmillan Cancer Support to test new innovative approaches to identifying cancer more quickly. We are also on track to have all bowel scope screening centres open by December 2016.

We have also made major investments in innovative radiotherapy. The £23 million Radiotherapy Innovation Fund has enabled the National Health Service to achieve 37% of radiotherapy treatments being given by Intensity Modulated Radiotherapy, which is more precise and has fewer side effects. This is ahead of the target of 24%, and up from 5% in 2010. NHS England has committed £6 million to support six trials of more precise stereotactic ablative radiotherapy (SABR), and a further £15 million over three years to evaluate and treat patients with SABR. We have also pledged £250 million for two proton beam therapy (PBT) centres at The Christie NHS Foundation Trust, Manchester, and University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, which will be operational by 2018. 134 patients (including 102 children) were sent abroad for PBT in 2014, up from 56 in 2010 (including 34 children).

Over 1.5 million people were urgently referred to a specialist for suspected cancer in 2014-15, an increase of over 645,000 or 71% compared to 2009-10, and nearly 273,000 patients began treatment for cancer, an increase of over 39,000 or 17% compared to 2009-10. In addition, 19 million crucial diagnostic tests were carried out, an increase of nearly 4.7 million or nearly 33% compared to 2009-10. This included 1.5 million more non-obstetric ultrasounds, 1 million more magnetic resonance imaging scans and 238,000 more endoscopies, all procedures often used to diagnose cancer.

The independent Cancer Taskforce has been set up by NHS England to produce a new cross-system national cancer strategy to take us through the next five years to 2020. The new strategy will set a clear direction covering the whole cancer pathway from prevention to end of life care and will be published in the summer. We will work with the NHS, charities and patient groups to deliver the new strategy.