Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to improve the (a) identification and (b) treatment of pancreatic cancer.

NHS England and NHS Improvement are accelerating access to cancer diagnosis and treatment, through non-symptom specific pathways and the new Faster Diagnosis Standard. In addition, we are investing £2.3 billion in community diagnostic centres and endoscopy services in the next three years, to improve the diagnosis and the detection of cancers, including pancreatic cancer.

The current ‘Help us help you’ campaign focuses on the barriers to earlier presentation across all cancer types. A further campaign is planned later in 2022 to address abdominal and urological symptoms, which can include symptoms relevant to pancreatic cancer.

NHS England and NHS Improvement have commissioned a new audit of pancreatic cancer services to support the National Health Service to identify and address variation in access to treatment. NHS England and NHS Improvement have worked with Pancreatic Cancer UK to raise awareness of Pancreatic Enzyme Replacement Therapy and shared guidance with Cancer Alliances.