​Hundreds of people have been diagnosed with lung cancer earlier through NHS mobile trucks, as part of the biggest programme to improve early lung cancer diagnosis in health service history.
By making it easier for people to get a Lung MOT in mobile facilities, visiting different areas across the country, 600 people have been diagnosed earlier, NHS England & Improvement reports.
The community initiative, part of the NHS Targeted Lung Health Check Programme, has seen more than three quarters (77%) of cancers caught at either stage one or two, giving patients a much better chance of beating the illness. This compares to less than a third of cancers caught at either stage one or two in 2018. People diagnosed with lung cancer at the earliest stage are nearly 20 times more likely to survive for five years than those whose cancer is caught late.
Mobile trucks are scanning those most at risk from lung cancer, including current and ex-smokers, inviting them for an MOT of their lungs and an on the spot chest scan for those at highest risk.
NHS cancer chiefs are urging those most at risk of lung cancer to come forward as soon as they are invited for a life-saving health check, to help even more people benefit from early diagnosis. The call comes as new figures show only a third (35%) of patients go to their lung health check when invited by the NHS.
A further 20 NHS lung truck sites are due to go live shortly with the capacity to invite 750,000 more people at increased risk for a check, in efforts to catch thousands more cancers at an earlier stage. So far, the 23 existing truck sites have issued up to 25,000 invitations every month.
As set out in the NHS elective recovery plan earlier this year, the NHS will increase capacity to deliver around 17 million diagnostic tests over a three-year period.
Dame Cally Palmer, NHS cancer director, said: “These lung checks can save lives – by going out into communities we find more people who may not have otherwise realised they have lung cancer – with hundreds already diagnosed and hundreds of thousands due to be invited. The trucks are conveniently located to make them easy to access and it is vital that as soon as you are invited, you take up the offer and come forward for these potentially life-saving checks.
“The rollout of our Targeted Lung Health Check Programme is a huge step towards reaching our NHS Long Term Plan ambitions of catching thousands more cancers at an earlier stage when they are easier to treat.”
Not only do the lung trucks scan for cancer, but they’ve also identified thousands of people with other undiagnosed conditions including respiratory and cardiovascular disease, enabling them to access the treatment they need earlier, and helping to prevent potential hospitalisations.
The elective recovery plan set out a blueprint to address backlogs built up during the pandemic, as well as tackling long waits for care. Overall, as many as 1.5 million people will have been invited for a lung health check across the country by 2024/25 with an estimated 7,700 cases caught earlier under NHS Long Term Plan.
Professor Peter Johnson, NHS clinical director for cancer said: “Lung cancer can often be hard to detect at an early stage and so these checks, close to people’s homes, show how the NHS is taking action to find more people with cancer. Lives are saved when cancers are caught early and when more people are referred for tests, which is why the NHS has put so much effort into early diagnosis in recent years."
