Cancer services plan for next decade put to NI public

People in Northern Ireland are being asked to give their opinions on a 10-year strategy for cancer services.

The plan covers four themes and makes 67 recommendations for cancer services over the next decade.

Cancer patients worked with policy-makers, medical experts and cancer charities to help develop the strategy.

The consultation will close on 20 October, with the equality impact assessment out for consultation for a further four weeks until 17 November.

The main theme of the strategy is prevention, with an emphasis on helping people make healthier choices about their diet and lifestyle to help reduce their cancer risk.

There are also recommendations on diagnosis and treatment, with a call for a new system to enable people to have their conditions confirmed more quickly.

The strategy - published on the Department of Health website - suggests creating support tailored to the needs of specific groups of patients, like young people aged 16 and over and children who have to travel for treatment.

It is also recommended that clinical nurse specialists, with specific skills in cancer support, should be available to all cancer patients throughout their treatment and care.

Northern Ireland's chief nursing officer Charlotte McArdle was the co-chair of the group that designed the strategy.

"There are huge opportunities in the cancer strategy to really make a difference for people with cancer, in terms of better communication, rapid access to diagnostics," she said.

"What we've heard over and over again is the difference a clinical nurse specialist makes to someone with a cancer journey.

"The provision of that clinical nurse specialist role will really help to provide information, support and improve the outcomes for people's lives."

This strategy has been more than two years in coming but cancer charities say it has largely been worth the wait.

There are questions, though, about how it will be paid for.

Announcing the strategy, Health Minister Robin Swann said the money for all of the proposals in it was not available in existing budgets.

However, it is a further indication of the direction of travel for the health service in Northern Ireland - creating regional services to best serve a small, dispersed population that still requires the quality of treatment and access to support that is available in other, larger countries.

Dervilia Kernaghan, a director at Cancer Focus NI, said the charity was "heartened" to receive details of the plan because there was an "obvious and pressing need for transformation".

"Working with cancer patients day in and day out, we hear every day how stressful delayed treatments and diagnostic testing can be," she said.

"That's why it was so important for us to work together with patients and colleagues across the health service to contribute to the strategy and ensure that it effectively addressed the needs of local people."

Ms Kernaghan said the charity would seek reassurances about how the plans within the strategy would be "resourced in the long-term".