MS, Cabinet Secretary for
Health and Social Care: As we today publish the Women's Health Plan,
and a year after the Senedd's Health and Social Care Committee
published its report into gynaecological cancer, this statement
provides an update about the work to improve NHS services for
women with gynaecological cancer.
There have been some important long-term improvements in the
survival rates for most gynaecological cancers and many women
report positive experience about their treatment.
But, the current performance by health boards against the 62-day
cancer target for gynaecological is simply not good enough at
around 38%. That means too few women are receiving the standard
of care we would expect.
We have made improving cancer services and outcomes a top
priority for the NHS. We have set out our expectations for
delivery in the NHS planning framework and the NHS performance
framework. This includes implementing the Quality Statement for Cancer
as part of local planning processes and meeting 75% against the
62-day cancer target.
We are working with the NHS in Wales to improve access so women
can get an earlier diagnosis and start treatment as soon as
possible. Two health boards have achieved more than 60%
compliance with the pathway target in the most recent performance
figures – but there is still a very long way to go to so all
women, all over Wales, can be assured of a similar standard of
service.
We have previously announced £2m a year for the NHS Executive's
national Planned Care Programme to deliver a Cancer Recovery
Programme to focus on improving cancer pathways with the poorest
performance, such as gynaecological cancer. The programme team is
working with health boards to implement the four nationally
agreed pathways for gynaecological cancer – for cancers of the
cervix, endometrium, ovary, and vulva.
These are part of
the Quality Statement for Cancer and set out for health boards
how they must plan and deliver services. We have reinforced this
requirement in two Welsh Health Circulars, and through two
Ministerial summits with NHS service leaders in the last 12
months.
Clinicians in the Cancer Recovery Programme and Wales Cancer
Network are developing a new pathway for women prescribed Hormone
Replacement Therapy who experience unexpected bleeding. This will
support the NHS to investigate suspected cancer referrals in a
timelier manner.
We also need to make sure that women who present to the NHS with
symptoms are heard and appropriately referred.
The Women's Health Plan must be the catalyst for real change in
the NHS. It must ensure women's experiences are properly
acknowledged and that women are listened to.
Health Education and Improvement Wales has rolled out digital
learning to all GPs to support clinical teams to assess people
who present with symptoms and to make good referral decisions.
The Rapid Diagnostic Centres, which were set up for people with
symptoms that don't match referral criteria for suspected cancer,
has developed pathways which provide GPs with an additional
option when they suspect cancer, but the symptoms do not clearly
relate to cancer referral guidelines. These are in place across
Wales and help to ensure there is another way to rapidly
investigate women where cancer is suspected.
We are also focusing on improving access to diagnostics and have
set out our approach in the Diagnostics Recovery and
Transformation Strategy.
More broadly, high take-up rates of HPV vaccination and cervical
screening will have a long-term impact on the incidence of
cervical cancer in the years ahead, and we have introduced a
clinical audit of ovarian cancer care to improve the quality of
treatment. These specific interventions sit alongside a number of
important service changes and investments, including the
development of the gynaecology hub at the Royal Glamorgan
Hospital, the ongoing construction of the new Velindre Cancer
Centre, and the replacement of radiotherapy equipment at our
three regional cancer centres.
There is a lot more to do to improve services for women with
gynaecological cancer. We remain committed to working with the
NHS to make these improvements.
