Six Actions for Improving Early Cancer Diagnosis

– In partnership with Royal Marsden Partners

Finding cancer early is the single biggest step we can make to improving patient outcomes and saving lives. In 2023 just 57.6% of staged cancers[1] were diagnosed at an early stage[2]. This is well below the NHS Long Term Plan ambition of 75% by 2028.

With just 1 in 15 cancers diagnosed via screening, improving early diagnosis is heavily reliant on symptomatic pathways. In practice, this means supporting patients to present early in primary care and supporting primary care to make appropriate referrals through Urgent Suspected Cancer (USC) pathways.

We have partnered with RM Partners, the Cancer Alliance serving North and South West London, to identify practical steps which can be taken in primary care to improve rates of diagnosis. The research is based on analysis of 46 interviews with GPs across West London alongside data including referral behaviour, workforce and population demographics.

The research identified six actions for general practice to increase early diagnosis:

1. Reviewing practice performance and operation: Understanding and reviewing cancer performance data, participating in cancer audits, internal case review and knowledge sharing.
2. Adopting quality systems: Use of best practice decision support and safety netting tools, underpinned by a culture of quality improvement.
3. Addressing systemic inequity: Increasing awareness of systemic inequity and the impact on cancer through training and actively implementing best-practice process.
4. Workforce stability: Retaining staff without high reliance on locums, whilst ensuring clear orientation of locums when required.
5. System awareness and participation: Awareness and use of direct access and Vague Symptom pathways, building relationships within PCNs and with secondary care
6. Training and clinical improvement: Accessing cancer-specific training to support the appropriate use of cancer pathways.

These findings are underpinning the support being provided to primary care teams within RMP. More detail on the research findings and recommendations as well as the methodology can be found below, and both reports are available to download.

[1] From CancerData. This excludes the 20% of cancers which are unstaged in the Rapid Cancer Registrations Dataset.

[2] Early stage is defined as a cancer diagnosed at Stage I/II