More than a third of cancer patients diagnosed in A&E

A new study has revealed that more patients are diagnosed with cancer in A&E in Britain than in other comparable high-income countries.

More than a third of patients in England, Scotland and Wales only find out they have the disease once they are in hospital. Data suggests that those who end up in A&E, sometimes after multiple trips to their GP, are less likely to survive the disease, particularly if they have stomach, bowel, liver, pancreatic, lung or ovarian cancer.

The findings are the result of research undertaken by the International Cancer Benchmarking Partnership and Cancer Research UK, who together examined cancer data and linked hospital admissions across 14 regions in six countries: Australia, Canada, Denmark, New Zealand, Norway and the UK.

The data was collected between 2012 and 2017, but CRUK said it feared the outlook is now even worse after the Covid-19 pandemic.

The study, which looked at eight major cancers, found that more than a third of patients in England (37 per cent), Wales (37 per cent) and Scotland (39 per cent) were diagnosed after being rushed to hospital. The three nations ranked worse than all other regions and countries in the study except New Zealand, where the rate was 43 per cent.

Michelle Mitchell, CRUK’s chief executive, said: “For months, we have been warning that cancer survival could go backwards due to the pandemic. The UK is already lagging when it comes to cancer survival – this study helps us understand why, showing that countries with higher levels of emergency presentations have lower survival.

“If we want to build a world-class cancer service, we need to learn from comparable countries and ensure fewer patients are being diagnosed with cancer after an emergency referral or trip to A&E. We’d like to see governments across the UK take bold action on this within their cancer plans so that by 2032, fewer than 10 per cent of cancer cases are diagnosed through emergency routes.”