Women should be offered cancer checks during work breaks and while shopping to boost uptake, a review says
WOMEN should be offered cancer checks during work breaks and while shopping to boost uptake, a review says.
Health chiefs must improve access to breast and cervical screening so saving thousands of lives.
Patients should get text reminders and GPs funds for out-of-hours appointments with all patients to get results in two weeks.
The recommendations — including Facebook uptake campaigns — are in a blueprint for the £660million-a-year NHS screening programme.
It sends out 15million invites a year but only two in three are taken up.
Breast and bowel screening targets have not been met and cervical checks are at a 21-year low, with embarrassment said to put many off.
Cancer expert and review leader Prof Sir Mike Richards said: “Catching cancer early saves lives but with family life so hectic it’s too easy to put job or family ahead of your health.
“When you can arrange everything from a plane ticket to a mortgage at the touch of a button we want to make health checks more convenient too.
“People should be able to get screened for cancer when they pop out for lunch or a coffee.”
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He said delays in introducing HPV cervical cancer tests and a new bowel cancer check had cost lives.
He blamed “confusion” over who is responsible for services — and called for Public Health England to be stripped of responsibility.
Macmillan Cancer Support called for urgent implementation of his recommendations.
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