Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have made an assessment of the skin cancer detection pilot scheme “Map My Mole” conducted by a small number of NHS GP surgeries in the South West, in particular with regard to potential for reducing unnecessary referrals and for saving NHS time and expense; and whether they plan to deliver home-use technology for detecting and assessing skin cancer risks.

The Department has not made a formal assessment of Map My Mole, the skin cancer detection pilot scheme. The Department is committed to getting the National Health Service diagnosing cancer earlier and treating it faster, so that more patients survive this horrible set of diseases, including skin cancer. To achieve this, the NHS has delivered an extra 40,000 operations, scans, and appointments each week as the first step to ensuring early diagnosis and faster treatment.

Since 2023/24, NHS England has also been rolling out teledermatology services, which allow a virtual review of dermoscopic images. In providers where this has been fully implemented, improvements in workforce capacity have been seen doubling the number of patients that can be reviewed per clinic in some cases, and improving faster diagnosis standard performance.

NHS England’s Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT) national report has provided recommendations to encourage the wider use of technology to ensure skin cancer patients get faster and more equitable access to care. GIRFT is also planning a programme to support primary care colleagues, offering training for new staff to recognise harmless skin lesions, like moles and warts, with the aim of reducing unnecessary referrals to hospital and freeing up capacity for other patients on the waiting list.