Improvements made on Birmingham hospital's cancer performance
Hospitals in Birmingham have made welcome improvements in their cancer performances but warned there was ‘still work to do’.
University Hospitals Birmingham (UHB) NHS Foundation Trust’s board was told it was back on track in it’s ’62 day performance’, which aims for patients to receive their initial treatment within that time.
In July, the trust delivered 62.4 per cent for patients getting their first treatment within 62 days, against it’s target of 60 per cent.
This was an improvement on 58.2 per cent in June although still behind it’s aspiration of reaching 75 per cent by the end of the financial year.
Earlier this year, it was announced UHB had been placed in NHS England’s Tier 1 for cancer support which is the highest level of oversight and support and means they are amongst the trusts that are most challenged in these areas.
In response to this plans were put in place to address, this while a UHB Cancer Board is being set up to provide oversight and trust wide improvement and continues to meet weekly.
Iain Pickles, Chief Operating Officer, said: “We had been behind plan on cancer performance during Quarter One.
“As we’ve moved into Quarter 2, in July for 62 day performance we actually returned to plan for the first time this year which is encouraging.
“We delivered 62.4 per cent of patients being managed within 62 days of referral against a plan of 60 per cent. Early view on August, we will be there or thereabouts on delivery plan as well.
“It is worth acknowledging however we are still a long way off the year end aspiration of delivering 75 per cent of patients being managed within the 62 days of referral.
“So still work to do, which is being taken by the weekly cancer operational board.”
He added: “For July, we were slightly behind the faster diagnosis standard which is ensuring patients receive a diagnosis within 28 days of referral.
“73.9 per cent of patients receive their diagnosis within 28 days against a plan of 74.9 per cent.
“The year end aspiration is to reach 80 per cent of patients being diagnosed within 28 days of referral.
“A key driver of that was a reduction in performance on the gynaecology pathway, work is underway in order to recover that and we can already see the beginnings of that in the early August data where we are forecasting we will be about on plan.”
