Bowel cancer tests at risk by staffing crisis

STAFF shortages in the NHS are putting thousands of bowel cancer patients in danger because of delays in introducing potentially lifesaving tests.

Patient groups say more than 5,000 people a year endure “unacceptable” waits, due to a lack of endoscopists, which is frustrating efforts to treat Britain’s second biggest cancer killer.

It comes after Andrew Lansley, the former health secretary, revealed in The Daily Telegraph he is being treated for bowel cancer.

Writing in yesterday’s newspaper, he criticised Treasury cuts that curtailed a national screening programme that could have detected his illness sooner. NHS figures showed that 2,379 patients waited more than the two-week target for an urgent endoscopy in 2017. Meanwhile 2,889 people displaying symptoms that required tests were forced to wait beyond a six-week maximum. Overall a quarter of hospitals breached national waiting time targets last year.

In January, the National Screening Committee recommended lowering the age for testing for bowel cancer in England from 60 to 50, as in Scotland. It followed a commitment by NHS England to introduce FIT (Faecal Immunochemical Test) screening in November.

If bowel cancer is diagnosed early, 98 per cent of patients can survive for at least five years. But only 15 per cent of patients are diagnosed at this stage. Lord Lansley said cuts to training had hit the rollout of an earlier screening programme.

Deborah Alsina, the chief executive of Bowel Cancer UK, said the delay to FIT tests was “simply unacceptable.”