It was reported last week that Sheryl Crow had surgery for breast cancer and would now have radiation therapy. Like most American women in the same situation, Ms. Crow will not wait for radiation therapy to begin.
Unfortunately, breast cancer patients in the U.K. needing radiation therapy after surgery are not so lucky:
More than half of cancer patients who need radiotherapy have to wait longer for their treatment than the recommended maximum of four weeks, according to the Royal College of Radiologists.
There is evidence, says the latest report, "that these delays reduce the chance of cure and worsen outcomes in some patients."
[...]
Of patients whose primary cancer treatment was radiotherapy, 53% had waited more than four weeks. The college says it is "good practice" to see patients within two weeks, and they should not wait beyond four. A slightly greater proportion - 57% - of those undergoing adjuvant radiotherapy following surgery waited more than four weeks. A third of patients waited more than the maximum two weeks for palliative radiotherapy, to reduce the symptoms of their cancer.
[...]
Breakthrough Breast Cancer, the patient support group, said it regularly hears from women with breast cancer who are worried about delays in obtaining radiotherapy. "We have heard of women having to wait four months for their radiotherapy when ideally it should follow hard on the heels of surgery to remove breast cancer,"
27 Feb 2006 @ 12:48pm