Europe

UK cancer patients waiting too long for vital tests

366964_UK-cancer-survival

Health experts in Britain have warned that thousands of cancer patients’ chances of survival are being put at risk after being forced to wait weeks for vital tests.

Latest figures revealed that in the month of April over 17,000 suspected cancer patients – or 2.2 percent of all the patients waiting for such tests – had to wait for more than six weeks for an MRI or CT scan.

The number of patients waiting longer than the NHS-recommended period of six weeks has doubled since last year, reaching its highest level since 2008.

Britain has one of the worst records in Europe for the late diagnosis of many cancers.

The government has announced multi-million-pound awareness campaigns to help reduce late diagnosis. The programs are aimed at educating the public about common symptoms.

The Department of Health has responded by giving an extra £250million to hospitals and GP-led organizations to keep waiting times down.

The announcement comes as new joint research by Macmillan Cancer Support and the National Cancer Intelligence Network (NCIN) revealed elderly patients are “being assessed on their age alone and not their overall fitness.”

UK survival rates in older people rank among the worst in Europe.

In November 2013, health watchdog the Care Quality Commission (CQC) warned that Britain’s National Health Service (NHS) hospitals had failed to improve the quality of patients’ care in the three years since the 2009 Mid Staffordshire scandal, when it was revealed that between 400 to 1,200 patients died as a result of poor care from January 2005 to March 2009.

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