The areas struggling most with cancer targets

Full Story in HSJ 24 January 2018

Cancer patients in three counties are at greater risk of death than elsewhere in the country because of slow referrals and late diagnosis, official data reveals.

Clinical commissioning groups in Essex, Kent and Lincolnshire are disproportionately represented in the worst performers against the national 62 day target – and in many cases their performance has got worse over the past two and a half years.

The standard is for 85 per cent of patients to start treatment within two months of an urgent cancer referral. However, the worst performing areas were more than 20 percentage points below that figure in quarter two of this year.