GPs are to start predicting whether a patient has the early symptoms of cancer using a computer program that calculates risk, under plans to prevent the 10,000 unnecessary deaths a year caused by late diagnosis.
The new approach by the NHS means that doctors will tell patients their percentage chance of having cancer, based on factors like their age, weight and symptoms such as bleeding or sudden weight loss.
Professor Mike Richards, the government’s cancer tsar, said that within five years every GP in England should be using the software as part of a new drive to reduce the huge toll of avoidable cancer deaths.
Computer-assisted cancer risk assessment will help GPs estimate whether a patient’s symptoms could indicate the presence of a cancer and decide whether they needed to refer them for urgent tests in hospital, Richards said.
The computer would assess a patient’s age, weight and symptoms - such as rectal bleeding and constant fatigue - and if the risk were above a certain level, the person would be referred to hospital for urgent exploratory tests within two weeks.
Cancer is the UK’s biggest killer after heart disease and strokes. Britain is far worse than many European countries at diagnosing cancer early, when it is more likely to be treatable and the patient has a much better chance of surviving. That is partly because some patients who develop symptoms delay seeking help, but also because GPs sometimes fail to correctly identify signs of cancer.
Read more at The Guardian.
Tags: Cancer
