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We are committed to improving survival rates for all cancer patients, including those with pancreatic cancer. We know that late presentation and patients having a more advanced stage of disease at diagnosis are two of the main reasons for variation in cancer survival outcomes. This is why we have prioritised achieving earlier diagnosis in ““Improving Outcomes: A Strategy for Cancer””, published on 12 January 2011. The Strategy, backed by more than £750 million over the spending review period, sets out an ambition to save an additional 5,000 lives every year by 2014-15 through earlier diagnosis of cancer and improved access to screening and treatment.We know that there are regional variations in the treatment, care and support provided to cancer patients in England. To support the national health service to tackle this, we are providing data to providers and commissioners that allow them to benchmark their services and outcomes against one another and to identify where improvements need to be made. Through the National Cancer Intelligence Network, we have already made available data collections on survival rates and surgical resection rates across a range of cancers, including pancreatic.In August 2011, the Department and the National Cancer Action Team published the ““Radiotherapy Dataset First Annual Report”” to help tackle unwarranted variation in radiotherapy services and from April 2012 we are mandating the collection of chemotherapy data to achieve the same. In ““Improving Outcomes a Strategy for Cancer: First Annual Report””, published on 13 December 2011, we have said that continuing to provide the NHS with benchmarked data on variations in services and outcomes as a lever for improvements is a priority for 2012.““Improving Outcomes in Upper Gastro-intestinal Cancers””, published in. 2001, sets out recommendations on the treatment, management and care of patients with upper, gastro-intestinal cancers, including pancreatic cancer. Our Cancer Outcomes Strategy makes it clear that the Improving Outcomes in Cancer guidance, now the responsibility of the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), will continue to be a feature of all commissioned cancer services. Through National Cancer Peer Review, a national quality assurance programme, NHS cancer services are. part of a rolling programme of assessment against a nationally agreed set of quality measures based on the NICE Improving Outcomes in Cancer guidance.To assess cancer patients' experience of care, during the first three months of 2010 the Department undertook a national survey of cancer care. ““The National Report of the 2010 Cancer Patient Experience Survey””, published in December 2010, is the largest England-wide survey of cancer patients' experience of care with over 67,000 respondents from 158 trusts. Patients with pancreatic cancer are included within the results for the 3,577 patients with upper gastro-intestinal (upper GI) cancers who participated in the survey. In the following table are the survey responses most relevant to the information requested. Percentages have been rounded to the nearest whole number.<Table width="100%" summary="" cellspacing="3" cellpadding="3" border="0"><TR><TD>Percentage</TD></TR><TR><TD>Question</TD><TD>Upper GI</TD><TD>All cancers</TD></TR><TR><TD>Completely understood explanation of what was wrong with them</TD><TD>73</TD><TD>74</TD></TR><TR><TD>Given the right amount of information about condition and treatment</TD><TD>87</TD><TD>88</TD></TR><TR><TD>Given a choice of different cancer treatments</TD><TD>84</TD><TD>83</TD></TR><TR><TD>Definitely involved in decisions about choice of cancer treatment</TD><TD>71</TD><TD>72</TD></TR><TR><TD>Given the name of a Cancer Nurse Specialist (CNS)</TD><TD>90</TD><TD>84</TD></TR><TR><TD>Found it easy to contact CNS (of those given a CNS)</TD><TD>75</TD><TD>75</TD></TR><TR><TD>CNS definitely listened carefully</TD><TD>92</TD><TD>91</TD></TR><TR><TD>CNS gave understandable answers to questions all or most of the time</TD><TD>87</TD><TD>91</TD></TR><TR><TD>Length of time spent with CNS was about right</TD><TD>95</TD><TD>95</TD></TR></Table>To incentivise quality improvements in patient treatment, care and experience, all participating trusts were sent a bespoke report showing their own results. Each report displayed the results for each question in the survey benchmarked against other trusts. These findings are helping the NHS to identify areas in cancer care that need improvement locally and develop services that are more responsive to patients' needs. We are carrying out a survey for 2011 that will show where improvements have been made and where further action is needed.To support the NHS to develop the CNS workforce, the Cancer Outcomes Strategy sets out our intention to build the evidence base for the benefits and costs savings that CNSs can offer. This follows an independent report we published in December 2010 that showed that, in many scenarios, the costs of additional support roles are likely to be outweighed by the savings that can be achieved. A series of case studies have now been produced to align with the Department's Nursing Career Framework, and the cancer version of the framework will be used to attract new nurses into oncology and aid the career development of the existing CNS workforce. |