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December 2011
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BOPA & UKONS Conference 2009
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National policy—challenges and opportunities
Already the mutual admiration between BOPA & UKONS was evident to all, but there was little time to reflect on the seaside romance. Fresh from the National Cancer Survivorship Initiative (NCSI) conference in September, Mike Richards, National Cancer Director for England, delivered an interesting talk on the challenges and opportunities afforded by the new national initiative known as QIPP (Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention). Delivering QIPP will be a serious business, given that the incidence of cancer is still climbing—probably a reflection of our ageing population—as is the number of people living with cancer. Also, according to Mike, early diagnosis in the UK still lags behind Europe, contributing to as many as 10,000 avoidable cancer deaths in the UK annually. He attributed these disappointing statistics to a combination of low public awareness of the early signs of cancer, poor access to GPs, poor diagnosis by GPs, and GPs having poor access to diagnostic services. He proposed the following actions:
- Baseline assessment by primary care organisations
- Raising of community awareness of screening and reporting of cancers
- Primary care audits
- Better diagnostic services
He suggested that the extra cost of these actions would be offset by a reduction in the numbers of patients with late-stage cancers requiring expensive treatments.
Mike finished off his talk with a brief summary of the NCSI’s five key recommendations. These were:
- An attitude change from ‘medical’ to ‘empowerment’, to shift the focus from disease to recovery and wellbeing
- Better provision of information for people living with and beyond cancer
- Assessment and care planning, aimed at understanding individual needs
- Tailored support, based on care planning, starting at the point of diagnosis
- A stronger focus on measuring experience and outcomes for cancer survivors
Answering questions, Mike gave two take-home messages—it helps to be able to demonstrate where you have given benefit, and, that although we are making good progress, we can still improve services without driving up costs.
Discussion.