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Government promises 'private standard' of cancer care

08 February 2010 Breaking News

Gordon Brown announced today that every cancer patient will get personal care in their home from a nurse, in a bid to meet the public's expectations for one-to-one, tailored support. 

In a speech to the King's Fund the Prime Minister also reiterated his pledge to reduce waiting times for cancer tests, including results, to one week. He said that within the next parliament waiting times between a GP consultation and appointment with a cancer specialist would fall to two weeks. Currently only those urgently referred by their GP fall into this target. The Health Secretary Andy Burnham has been asked to bring forward proposals to give people the right to receive chemotherapy in their own home, something many private medical insurers currently fund.

Steve Flanagan, managing director of Bupa Home Healthcare, said: "We agree with the Prime Minister's views that it is better for patients to be treated in their own homes.

"Our experience of caring for 14,500 NHS patients in their own homes shows it can be more cost-effective, helps avoid hospital-acquired infections, and produces higher levels of patient satisfaction.

"This is a key way for the NHS to meet its goals of improving its services against the background of the current economic climate and pressure on public spending."

Although guidelines from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) have consistently emphasised the importance of nurse specialists in providing one to one support for cancer patients, figures show significant variation in access. There is one breast care nurse for every 72 breast cancer patients compared to one lung cancer specialist nurse for every 132 lung cancer patients (of whom just 51% are seen by a specialist nurse according to the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation).

The Conservatives claim that the government cut the amount the NHS spends on each cancer patient by hundreds of pounds last year.

Shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley said: "Cancer nurses do a fantastic job and we know it makes a really big difference to cancer patients and their families to have a named specialist looking after them. It is important that we do everything we can for people suffering from such debilitating conditions. It would be great if we could afford to provide a nurse like this for every cancer patient.

"However, it is unclear how the government plans to pay for this. Just last year Labour cut the amount the NHS spent on each cancer patient by £650. Given that we know that Labour are planning even further cuts to NHS spending in the years ahead, I'm worried that they are not being straight with the public.  It is very difficult to see how they will be able to fund their pledge for one-to-one nursing.

"Also, Labour have promised this before and haven't delivered. As far back as 2003 they were promising that each patient would have a ‘named nurse' to coordinate their care for cancer."

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