Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make it his policy to establish a regular bladder cancer audit to (a) reduce data gaps in the reporting of (i) incidence and (ii) staging, (b) capture data on inequalities and (c) provide an evidence base for addressing unwarranted variation in early diagnosis and outcomes for bladder cancer.

The NHS Cancer Programme commissioned the Royal College of Surgeons to deliver six new clinical audits, in primary breast cancer, metastatic breast cancer, ovarian cancer, pancreatic cancer, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and kidney cancer, on top of four existing audits in bowel, lung, oesophago-gastric, and prostate cancer. These audits were chosen because analysts considered that they are the cancers which audits would have the most potential to reduce unwarranted variation in treatment and outcomes. For these reasons, there are no plans to undertake a clinical audit for bladder cancer.

The National Cancer Plan will include further details on how we will improve outcomes for cancer patients, including those with bladder cancer, as well as speeding up diagnosis and treatment, ensuring patients have access to the latest treatments and technology, and ultimately bringing this country’s cancer survival rates back up to the standards of the best in the world.