Breast cancer survival rates in Northern Ireland increased to nine out of 10 women, it was revealed today.
Improved quality of treatment was partly responsible, with more patients taking diagnostic tests and twice as many women having chemotherapy in 2006 compared to a decade earlier, the Queen’s University Belfast study showed.
Over 3,000 patients were diagnosed with prostate, breast or colorectal cancer between 1996 and 2006.
Dr Anna Gavin, director of the Northern Ireland Cancer Registry, said: “We have excellent facilities at the cancer centre and cancer units and there is now a more joined-up approach to patient care with, for example, the centralisation of breast cancer services in each (health) trust area.
“Another important step forward is that we now have better communications between healthcare professionals and their patients. And alongside this, there is an increased use of multidisciplinary team meetings attended by a range of health care staff dealing with patients.”
Survival rates for breast cancer patients diagnosed in 2006 improved from 2001 and 1996. The research said 94.3 per cent were alive after one year and 90.6 per cent after two years. In 1996, these figures were 91 per cent and 84.5 per cent respectively.
Dr Gavin added there had been increases in use of radiotherapy and the availability of reconstructive surgery after treatment.
There has been a doubling in the number of patients being treated for prostate cancer in Northern Ireland over the 10 years examined in the report. This is explained by the increased use of diagnostic tests.
Health Minister Michael McGimpsey said over the past three years, additional funding has been allocated to cancer services that has enabled the introduction of bowel cancer screening and a vaccination programme for cervical cancer. The upper age limit for breast screening was extended to 70.
PA