Skip to main content

Publication, Part of

Routes to Diagnosis, 2018

Publication Date:
17 Mar 2022
Geographic Coverage:
England
Geographical Granularity:

Previous Chapter

Background

Current Chapter

Results

View all

Changes in the Routes 2018 publication

There were a few minor changes applied throughout the publication. Below is a full list of the changes:

  • D09.1 is no longer mapped to bladder and renal pelvis subgroups, now mapped to urethra only.
  • C80 repeated row has been removed.
  • C16.0 is no longer mapped to oesophagus, now mapped to stomach only.
  • C64 no longer mapped to renal pelvis, now mapped to kidney only.
  • Re-labelling of bladder to bladder (invasive)
  • Re-labelling of bladder (invasive and non-invasive) to bladder (insitu).
  • All files now include an "All malignant neoplasm" breakdown
  • "Sex" has been renamed to "Gender" throughout.
  • Cancer alliance geographies have been updated to those for 2018.

All figures and spreadsheets have been updated to match these changes.

1 December 2022 09:30 AM

Page contents

Results

The latest results for 2018 show encouraging trends in several areas. For all malignant cancers (excluding non-melanoma skin cancer) emergency presentations continue to fall: down to 18.5% from 19.0% in 2017. Those referred with suspected cancer symptoms on a TWW pathway also continued the pattern of previous years – rising to 39.8%, up from 38.2% in 2017. Additionally, the percentage of cancers diagnosed through screening programmes has risen from 6.0% in 2017 to 6.2% in 2018. Figure 1 shows the patterns for each route since 2006.

Figure 1: Percentage of diagnoses by presentation route. All malignant neoplasms (excluding non-melanoma skin cancer) by year

Many cancer sites show similar results. Emergency presentations remain low for female breast cancer, whilst the percentage of female breast cancer detected via screening continues to increase. Lung cancer shows small decreases in those diagnosed through TWWs and GP referrals alongside a small increase in patients presenting as an emergency. Colorectal and prostate cancers mirror the overall trend. The balance of routes for the biggest cancer sites in 2018 is shown in figure 2.

Figure 2: Treemaps for female breast, colorectal, lung and prostate cancers by route in 2018

The inequalities in previous releases persist with the 2018 data. These represent an area with some of the most potential to improve outcomes for patients and will be examined with future releases of data. Differences between cancer sites are also of interest and the groupings used for sites will be revised to better reflect current clinical guidance.

Last edited: 1 December 2022 9:49 am

Pages in this publication