Late diagnosis kills 10,000 yearly
Injury lawyers have revealed shocking news of medical negligence, which invades UK hospitals.
Failure to pick up cancer at an early stage by doctors costs 10,000 lives per year in England.
National Cancer Director Mike Richards stated: “These delays in the patient presenting with symptoms and cancer being diagnosed at a late stage inevitably costs lives. The situation is unacceptable so the first big step has been to understand why the delays occur.”
Overall he called the system “unacceptable.” Presently 90% of patients are diagnosed by symptoms, rather than through screening – meaning the risk of a blunder is high.
Professor Richards pointed out that if Great Britain echoed Europe’s diagnosis technique, then the number of deaths could dramatically be dropped.
However, he noted that doctors and GPs cannot take all the blame because patients often ignore their symptoms as they feel they do not want to waste doctor’s time. A recent study proved this point. 40% of people would delay visiting a GP for fear of being labelled a hypochondriac or a time waster.
Therefore, he said that research was now under way to examine how best to tackle this dilemma. His staff are working with GPs to carry out a national audit revealing the extent of delays and where they exist.
Despite this, medical negligence is the other half of the problem. As a result, the National Awareness and Early Diagnosis Initiative (NAEDI) have started to improve screening services.
Professor Steve Field, chairman of the Royal College of GPs, said GPs should reflect on whether there were things they could do to make sure cancer symptoms were picked up earlier.
He stated: “It's wrong to blame GPs for all these deaths, as there are many factors involved, including patients not recognising symptoms of cancer and not talking to their GP about them, especially middle-aged men. But I'm sure that we could all at times be more alert to symptoms and investigate and refer patients quicker.”
Katherine Murphy, director of the Patients' Association, commented: “Some patients are diagnosed with cancer when they have presented with the same symptoms six months earlier.
“Patients will sometimes tell us that they had been going to see their GP for six to nine months with, say, a pain in their stomach and were told to go to the pharmacy and buy an over-the-counter medicine (and later are found to have cancer).”
Advocates for change
Due to the growing rise in medical errors, many political and clinical experts have called for change amoungst English hospitals.
Andy Burnham, the health secretary, said he had called on the regulatory authority to create rules for health services: “It has to be the highest priority for everyone at the Department of Health and in the NHS to ensure that the appropriate action is taken.”
Prime Minister Gordon Brown also acknowledged the problem, saying: “We have always got to be vigilant and monitor standards and safety in hospitals.”
In the health field the Patients Association has called for urgent reform of the way hospitals are regulated, saying patients had been “appallingly” let down.
Monitor chairman Dr William Moyes agreed: “I am very disappointed in some of the failings in care that have been uncovered in the last few weeks. But that is not to say that every aspect of every service in every hospital is poor - it isn't.”
Updated on 02/12/2009