Asked by: Torcuil Crichton (Labour - Na h-Eileanan an Iar)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has considered ensuring that the TRANSFORM trial includes representation from Scotland.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department invests over £1.6 billion each year on research through its research delivery arm, the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR).
In November 2023, the Government and Prostate Cancer UK (PCUK) announced the £42 million TRANSFORM screening trial to find the best way to screen men for prostate cancer, in order to find it before it becomes advanced and harder to treat. PCUK is managing the award on behalf of the funders, with the Government contributing £16 million through the NIHR.
Once received, the protocol will be published on the NIHR’s website on the funding and awards page. This is expected to contain details of the site selection criteria. TRANSFORM will aim to recruit men from across the United Kingdom, including Scotland.
Asked by: Torcuil Crichton (Labour - Na h-Eileanan an Iar)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to support a national public awareness campaign on prostate cancer risk factors and the benefits of early detection for high-risk groups.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England run Help Us Help You campaigns to increase knowledge of cancer symptoms and address the barriers to acting on them, to encourage people to come forward as soon as possible to see their general practitioner. The campaigns focus on a range of symptoms, as well as encouraging body awareness to help people spot symptoms across a wide range of cancers at an earlier point.
The Department continues to advise patients to follow National Health Service guidance on signs and symptoms of several types of cancer, including prostate cancer. This advice is available publicly on the NHS.UK website, at the following link:
https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/prostate-cancer/
To address disparities and find ways to better detect prostate cancer earlier, we have invested £16 million in the United Kingdom-wide TRANSFORM trial, aimed at helping find the best ways of detecting prostate cancer in men, even if they are not displaying any symptoms. This research will aim to address some of the inequalities that exist in prostate cancer diagnosis by targeting black men in trial recruitment, ensuring that one in ten participants are black men.
We have also asked the National Screening Committee to review the evidence for prostate cancer screening, including for high-risk groups like black men.