"Improvements to cancer screening in the UK need to be made quickly and safely to ensure the NHS can diagnose people earlier. Even though NHS staff on the ground are doing everything they can to diagnose people early, the Government needs to back them up with significant investment to train and recruit more staff so that doctors, nurses and other specialists can diagnose more people at an early stage, when treatment is more likely to be successful."

FIT bowel screening is a more accurate way to test for early stage bowel cancer, than the previous test, known as gFOBT. It was introduced in England last year and has been running in Scotland for two years.


The latest figures show that around 42,000 people are diagnosed with bowel cancer each year in the UK which equates to more than 110 people every day. Around 16,300 people die from bowel cancer every year. And in England, more than half of bowel cancers with a known stage are diagnosed at a late stage.*****

Dr Ed Seward, consultant gastroenterologist and Cancer Research UK's clinical adviser said: "When we treat bowel cancer patients who were diagnosed at an early stage, we have curative treatments we can offer, including surgery. It can be devastating to patients and their families when the disease is caught at a late stage, which is why the bowel screening programme is so important - finding cancers when they haven't caused symptoms at all. So we really don't want to see patients missing out on a potentially life-saving opportunity."

Notes to editor:

FIT stands for Faecal Immunochemical Test. It is a type of faecal occult blood test which uses antibodies that specifically recognise human haemoglobin (Hb). It is used to detect, and can quantify, the amount of human blood in a single stool sample. An abnormal result suggests that there may be bleeding within the gastrointestinal tract that requires further investigation. Those with an abnormal result are then invited for further testing via a colonoscopy. NHS England has committed to optimising bowel screening, which includes extending the age and reducing the threshold. This will require more staff. The bowel screening programme is intended for people without any signs or symptoms suggestive of bowel cancer.

There have been some positive steps in the short term to tackle staff shortages. For example, Health Education England has funded a clinical endoscopist programme, which trains nurses and other healthcare professionals to deliver some of the tests that can diagnose bowel cancer. HEE has also recently announced funding for advanced training for scientists working in healthcare to handle and report biopsy samples. The Government has announced a 3.4% real terms spending increase for the HEE budget in 2020/21. This is a positive first step but would only equate to about £220m additional investment. Growing the workforce in the long-term requires sustained investment in the Spending Review which is expected later this year.

Endoscopy Homepage