With the current COVID-19 pandemic, the NHS is under severe strain. To manage the crisis all routine operations have been cancelled in many hospitals and the treatment of cancers put on hold. Some patients will have non-standard treatments that may be known to be inferior or not proven so that some form of treatment can be started or to delay the need for surgery. While this is understandable, non-standard treatments and delays to the treatment of cancer can and will adversely affect outcomes. Depending on how long treatment is delayed patients will have lower chances of cure and some will become incurable because of the delay.
This website has been produced by The British Association of Surgical Oncology to collect data on these delays and ventures into non-standard pathways and to produce weekly reports to highlight the plight of cancer surgery. In the weeks and months that come, unpalatable decisions will have to be made about prioritising the provision of healthcare. Without adequate knowledge of what the situation is nationally, the community of cancer clinicians may not have the voice to argue effectively for the restarting of cancer staging and treatment.
The information we need is simple. For each of the cancer types that you manage we need to know:
You will need to register with a valid NHS email address to be able to enter data.
We hope to have the first Situation Report produced at the end of April. After that we hope to publish weekly reports. The more surgeons and hospitals that are involved, the more powerful the message. If you do want to get involved please also let your colleagues both in your own and in other hospitals know.
The site can also be a sounding board for your views on what is happening in the real world. Registered contributers can post blogs that others can comment on, and there are also forums available for discussion. Logged-in users can also see other registered contributers and use to site to contact them.
The website is a work in progress. If you see any problems or have suggestions (or even what to get involved) please use the Contact Us tab to get in touch.
Also contact us if you want to copy the website for other countries or for any other reason.We would be happy to help.