Found: Food, diet, nutrition and cancer
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to improve the (a) diagnosis and (b) treatment of breast cancer.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Improving early diagnosis of cancer including breast cancer is a priority for the National Health Service. The NHS has an ambition to diagnose 75% of cancers at stage 1 or 2 by 2028, which will help tens of thousands of people live for longer. Additionally, the new cancer standards developed and supported by cancer doctors and implemented in October 2023 will ensure patients are diagnosed faster and treatment starts earlier.
The NHS Cancer Programme has also commissioned five new cancer clinical audits including metastatic breast cancers. These will provide timely evidence for cancer service providers where patterns of care in England may vary, increase the consistency of access to treatments and help stimulate improvements in cancer treatment and outcomes for patients. The Royal College of Surgeons began work on this audit in October 2022 with the first outcomes expected in 2024.
In January 2022 we provided £10 million of funding for 28 new breast screening units and nearly 60 life-saving upgrades to services in the areas where they are most needed, so more women can be checked for signs of cancer, speeding up diagnosis and treatment.
Asked by: Grahame Morris (Labour - Easington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, which Minister in her Department is responsible for delivery of (a) cancer screening programmes and (b) the NHS public health Section 7A agreement.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
My role as the Minister of State for Health and Secondary Care includes responsibility for major diseases including cancer, and for screening.
In accordance with the NHS Public Health Functions Agreement (made under section 7A of the NHS Act 2006) NHS England is responsible for providing or securing the provision of breast, bowel and cervical screening programmes and other specified public health services.
My Rt. Hon friend, Andrea Leadsom MP, the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Public Health, Start for Life and Primary Care, has led ministerial responsibility for arrangements under section 7A.
Feb. 08 2024
Source Page: Waiting times for suspected and diagnosed cancer patients for December 2023 & Q3 2023/24Found: Waiting times for suspected and diagnosed cancer patients for December 2023 & Q3 2023/24
Asked by: Karin Smyth (Labour - Bristol South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to her Department's press release entitled Digital pathology to improve cancer screening and save lives, published on 5 January 2024, what additional training will be given to pathologists working to enable the quick uptake of new technology.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Following the recommendation from the UK National Screening Committee to support the use of digital pathology in the National Health Service cervical, breast and bowel cancer screening programmes, NHS England are investing in and working with the Royal College of Pathologists in the on-going development of an online Pathology Portal.
This digital learning platform will support trainees and established pathology practitioners in digital pathology to ensure that digital learning materials are available to the multi-professional workforce.
NHS England plans to issue guidance at the end of January 2024 for the three NHS Cancer Screening Programmes, to support local providers of histopathology services who wish to implement digital pathology for the reporting of screening cases.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure that the 15 per cent shortfall in clinical oncologists, as estimated in the Royal College of Radiologists workforce census, does not impact the operational performance of radiotherapy services.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
According to the latest data, of those 10,328 cancer patients referred for first or subsequent treatment for radiotherapy in March 2024, 89.7% were treated within 31 days. The proportion of patients waiting more than 31 days for radiotherapy treatment in March 2024 was therefore 10.3%. This has decreased by 4.5% since January 2024.
We are aware of regional disparities in wait times for cancer treatment through NHS England’s data, and are considering the findings made by the Royal College of Radiologists. Tackling inequalities in outcomes, experience, and access of cancer diagnostics, including regional disparities, is a key focus of the Government. NHS England has commissioned six new cancer clinical audits in breast cancer, both primary and metastatic, as well as ovarian, pancreatic, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and kidney cancer. These will provide timely evidence for cancer service providers of where patterns of care in England may vary, increase the consistency of access to treatments, and help stimulate improvements in cancer treatments and outcomes for patients. The first outcomes of these audits are expected in September 2024.
The Department is working closely with NHS England to make sure we have the right workforce with the right skills up and down the country. In 2023/24, NHS England invested an additional £50 million to increase the number of cancer and diagnostic specialists.
The Government is also backing the NHS Long Term Workforce Plan, with over £2.4 billion over the next five years to fund additional education and training places. The plan sets out an aim to double the number of medical school places in England to 15,000 places a year by 2031/32, and to work towards this expansion by increasing places by a third, to 10,000 a year, by 2028/29.
We are building our cancer workforce. In January 2024 there were over 35,200 full-time equivalent (FTE) staff in the cancer workforce, an increase of over 13,300, or 60.7% since January 2010. Regarding clinical oncology specifically, as of January 2024, there are currently over 1,600 FTE doctors working in the speciality of clinical oncology in National Health Service trusts and other core organisations in England. This is over 30, or 2.2%, more than last year, over 300, or 27.7%, more than 2019, and over 600, 66.5%, more than in 2010. This includes over 900 FTE consultants. This is over 40, or 5.1%, more than last year, over 100, 22.0%, more than in 2019, and over 400, 80.2%, more than in 2010.
Correspondence May. 28 2024
Committee: Health and Social Care Committee (Department: Department of Health and Social Care)Found: Chair to Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on Future Cancer 23.05.24 Correspondence
Mentions:
1: Alec Shelbrooke (Con - Elmet and Rothwell) Key stages 3 to 4 include lessons on breast cancer, in collaboration with breast cancer charity CoppaFeel - Speech Link
2: Damian Hinds (Con - East Hampshire) We are investing £25 million to establish women’s health hubs, which will improve access to services - Speech Link
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make a comparative assessment of the adequacy of funding her Department provides to help tackle (a) less survivable cancers compared to (b) other cancers; and if she will make it her policy to (i) create a framework assessing the challenges around cancers with lower survival rates and (ii) increase funding for those cancers.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is taking steps through NHS England to improve outcomes for cancer patients, including those with less survivable cancers. Making improvements across different cancer types is critical to helping achieve the NHS Long Term Plan ambition of diagnosing 75% of patients at an early stage by 2028 and reducing inequalities in cancer survival. NHS England has commissioned new cancer clinical audits covering five cancer types, some of which are less survivable: pancreatic cancer, ovarian cancer, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, kidney cancer and primary and metastatic breast cancer. All five audits will cover care delivered in England and Wales and will see an investment of approximately £5.4 million for an initial period of three years.
NHS England is responsible for funding allocations to integrated care boards (ICBs). ICBs then decide how that money is spent within the local integrated care system. The allocations process is independent of Government and NHS England takes advice on the underlying formula from the independent Advisory Committee on Resource Allocation. NHS England produces a target allocation, or 'fair share' for each area, based on a complex assessment of factors such as demography, morbidity, deprivation, and the unavoidable cost of providing services in different areas. This means that funding decisions are fair and equitable.
Delivering more research is key to understanding and assessing the challenges around cancers with lower survival rates. As with other Government funders of health research, the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) does not allocate funding for specific disease areas, including less survivable cancers. The level of research spend in a particular area is driven by factors including scientific potential and the number and scale of successful funding applications. The NIHR welcomes funding applications for research into any aspect of human health, including less survivable cancers.
Asked by: Baroness Merron (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Markham on 24 January (HL1798), why there are no timescales for reaching the achievable target of 80 per cent for breast cancer screening.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England has developed an internal national plan in collaboration with key stakeholders to improve uptake within the breast screening programme from 2023 and beyond. This plan will encompass a series of evaluative projects which are expected to report by April 2024
There is currently no intention of publishing the internal plan, but it is available on the NHS Futures Platform. This is a collaboration platform that empowers everyone working in health and social care to safely connect, share and learn across boundaries.
NHS England and the Department are working in collaboration to establish a set of improvement objectives. Rather than a timescale for reaching the target of 80%, each region has a local improvement plan and are working to reach the agreed efficiency standard following restoration of services post COVID-19 pandemic. It was agreed that a quantified focus on reducing variation was preferable to setting timescales.