Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps is she taking to help ensure that 75% of stageable cancers are diagnosed at stages 1 and 2.

Improving early diagnosis of cancer remains a priority for the Government. We are working towards the NHS Long Term Plan’s ambition of diagnosing 75% of stageable cancers at stage one and two, by 2028.

NHS England’s comprehensive Early Diagnosis strategy is based on six core strands of activity, from raising awareness of cancer symptoms and encouraging people to come forward, to implementing targeted interventions for particular cancer types that we know have previously experienced later stages of diagnosis.

To support this, NHS England introduced the Faster Diagnosis Standard (FDS) which sets a maximum target of a 28 day wait from urgent suspected general practitioner or screening referral to patients being told they have, or do not have, cancer. The FDS also intends to reduce unwarranted variation in England by understanding how long it is taking people to receive a diagnosis or all clear for cancer.

In order to find and diagnose cancers earlier, NHS England is streamlining cancer pathways to support diagnosis within 28 days by implementing non-symptom specific pathways for patients who present with non-specific symptoms that can indicate several cancers, as well as implementing timed cancer pathways.