‘ED patients’ cancer has advanced due to Covid crisis delays’
PATIENTS are showing up in hospital emergency departments with advanced bowel cancer after putting off treatment during the Covid crisis, a consultant has warned.
Professor Glen Doherty, consultant gastroenterologist at St Vincent’s Hospital in Dublin, said some of these cancer patients are clearly unwell by the time they show up in hospital.
He also said that some cancers might not be detected because of the large numbers of people passing through emergency departments.
‘We are now increasingly seeing the knock-on effects of the Covid pandemic for people with other diseases including cancer. Some patients are now presenting for the first time with very large and advanced bowel tumours, in some instances through the emergency department, and some have clearly been unwell for some time,’ he said.
He added that a large number of patients are awaiting a routine colonoscopy.
‘Even if only a small proportion of those people turn out to have a more serious problem like bowel cancer, it still means people are potentially getting lost in that large pool of patients. It’s something we are working to address,’ said Prof. Doherty.
He added: ‘If people on a waiting list have symptoms of bowel cancer that have worsened or deteriorated, they should see their GP again as some may need to be rereferred and prioritised for more urgent investigation.’
His comments come as the Irish Cancer Society has expressed major concern at waiting lists for colonoscopies and the impact this could have on cancer survival.
The latest available figures show 15,674 people referred for a routine colonoscopy had been waiting longer than 13 weeks as of the end of March.
The HSE’s own target is for 65% of referrals for routine colonoscopies to be assessed within 13 weeks.
At the end of March, only 45% of referrals had met this target, the Irish Cancer Society said yesterday.
Its director of advocacy, Rachel Morrogh, said early detection of bowel cancer is crucial, but added that waiting lists have been made worse by Covid and last year’s cyber attack on the HSE.
‘Recent years have seen growing demand for endoscopy services in Ireland, but capacity and staffing levels haven’t grown at the rate required to meet it, and this has seen growing waiting lists, worsened by the impact of Covid and last year’s cyber attack,’ she said.
‘Some progress has been made in recent budgets, but Government needs to provide a sustained funding stream for new posts in endoscopy services to meet demand and to support innovative new services like capsule colonoscopy and the use of faecal immunochemical tests [which can pick up early signs of cancer] for patients with lowrisk symptoms.’
She added: ‘The longer people have to wait, the greater risk to their outcome if they receive a cancer diagnosis. Anything that’s unexplained, unusual or persistent should be checked by your GP.’
This week the Irish Daily Mail showed how women with a cancer-causing gene mutation are being told to expect to wait up to four years for potentially life-saving surgery. Those with the BRCA1 gene mutation have up to a 90% chance of developing breast cancer, while this stands at 85% for those with the BRCA2 mutation.
Support groups have criticised the surgery wait times as ‘scandalous’.
‘Presenting with large tumours’