According to a new study, published in The Lancet today, cancer patients in England, Wales and Northern Ireland have lower survival rates than those in Australia, Canada, Sweden and Norway.
This is the first study in a programme to investigate international survival disparities, with the aim of informing health policy to raise standards and reduce inequalities in survival.
The scientists analysed data on 2.4 million cancer patients in the UK (not including Scotland), Australia, Canada, Denmark, Norway and Sweden focusing on cancers of breast, bowel, lung and ovarian. They examined the survival rate at 1 and 5 years between 1995 and 2007 and found that in some cases survival rates in the UK are more than 10% lower than Europe, Australia and Canada particularly in the first year after diagnosis. In the 5-year survival rate, UK was the worst in bowel, lung and breast cancer. Denmark also lags behind, though generally its outcomes were not as bad as the UK's.
The authors said, "Differences in individual, health-system and clinical factors - such as public awareness of cancer, diagnostic delay, stage, comorbidity and access to optimum treatment - are all potential explanations for the overall differences in relative survival. The patterns are consistent with late diagnosis or differences in treatment, particularly in Denmark and the UK, and in patients aged 65 years and older".
Cancer Research UK urges the government to focus on early diagnosis and on improving equitable access to treatment. It also urges collecting reliable and good quality information nationally in order to understand the extent of the problem and identify the causes of the survival gap within the UK and other countries.
Source: Cancer survival in Australia, Canada, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and the UK, 1995—2007 (the International Cancer Benchmarking Partnership): an analysis of population-based cancer registry data. The Lancet, Early Online Publication, 22 December 2010
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