Cancer Treatment Targets Not Being Met Scots Hospitals Struggle With Two-Month Limit
Posted on: Wednesday, 8 March 2006, 15:00 CST
By GRAEME MURRAY
HEALTH bosses are struggling to meet some targets for cancer treatment waiting times in Scotland.
Half of men with prostate cancer - one of the most common types - are waiting two months or more to start treatment and waiting times for breast cancer treatment have increased.
Some types of cancer are being treated faster but for others, between a quarter and a third of patients given an urgent referral are still waiting for treatment two months later and, in some instances, eight or nine months.
Under a Scottish Executive target, the maximum time from urgent referral to treatment for all cancers should have been two months by the end of 2005.
NHS Greater Glasgow beat the average percentage of patients being seen in the two-month target for breast, skin and colorectal cancer but fell back with the percentage of patients being treated for lung and ovarian cancer and lymphoma.
The delays for treating cancer patients emerged in new figures published by the Executive.
The figures, for the third quarter of last year, show 81-per cent of breast cancer patients were treated within two months, compared with 86-per cent in the previous quarter.
The number of skin cancer patients treated within the target time remained static at 86-per cent.
Lung cancer treatment times improved from 70-per cent to 77-per cent nationally, ovarian from 86-per cent to 92-per cent, colorectal from 56-per cent to 67-per cent, and lymphoma from 58-per cent to 64- per cent.
In Glasgow, however, 93-per cent of breast cancer sufferers were referred within two months, with skin cancer figures at 89-per cent and lung cancer at 71-per cent. Statistics for ovarian cancer showed 82-per cent of people met the target, while colorectal cancer was 71- per cent and lymphoma 50-per cent.
Health Minister Andy Kerr said: "The figures show we are heading in the right direction with cancer types such as colorectal, ovarian, lung and lymphoma.
"Nevertheless, progress in some areas is not as good as I would have hoped."
Source: Evening Times; Glasgow (UK)
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