answer text |
<p>The National Health Service is taking several steps to improve bowel cancer outcomes
for patients across England. The NHS is working towards its Long Term Plan’s ambition
of diagnosing 75% of all stageable cancers at stage one and two, by 2028. Achieving
this will mean that an additional 55,000 people each year will survive their cancer
for at least five years after diagnosis. With progress made on reducing waiting times,
cancer is being diagnosed at an earlier stage more often, with survival rates improving
across almost all types of cancer.</p><p> </p><p>In 2023, NHS England’s Help Us Help
You campaign urged people to take up the offer of bowel screening when invited, while
gradually extending the screening offer from those aged 60 down to 50 years old, ensuring
more people are diagnosed with bowel cancer at the earliest stage.</p><p> </p><p>The
NHS is also now offering routine preventative bowel cancer screening to thousands
of people in England with a genetic condition, Lynch syndrome, that increases their
chance of developing bowel cancer and certain other cancers. This gives the NHS a
better chance of finding cancers at a time when they can be more easily and effectively
treated.</p><p> </p><p>Tackling disparities is important in improving all types of
cancer outcomes. The Government is committed to its levelling up mission, to narrow
the gap in healthy life expectancy by 2030 and increase healthy life expectancy by
five years by 2035. Our approach will continue to focus on supporting people to live
healthier lives, helping the NHS and social care provide the best treatment and care
for patients, and tackling health disparities through national and system interventions
such as the NHS’s Core20PLUS5 programme.</p><p> </p><p>The Office for Health Improvement
and Disparities was set up to address health inequalities with a range of interventions,
including accelerating prevention programmes, reducing digital exclusion, supporting
general practice in deprived communities, and improving health literacy.</p>
|
|