Role of NHS in raising awareness about prostate cancer risk
Addressing NHS ambitions of earlier diagnosis and tackling health inequalities
Supporting our NHS
We’d like to support our primary and secondary care colleagues in achieving better outcomes for men at risk of prostate cancer and ensuring NHS goals related to early cancer diagnosis and CORE20PLUS5 and the health inequalities agenda are achieved.
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NHS Long Term Plan sets out key ambitions for 75% of cancers to be diagnosed at early stages 1 and 2 by 2028.
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CORE20PLUS5 addresses health inequalities targeting those in the most deprived areas, with one of the plus5 areas of focus being early cancer diagnosis.
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Primary Care Network DES contract specification 2025/26 emphasises the importance of collaboration and working with external partners to achieve their goals.
How we can support
For primary care colleagues in England, the DES specification states that a PCN must seek to improve health outcomes for its population using a data-driven approach and population health management techniques in line with guidance and the CORE20PLUS5 approach.
We’ve outlined the detail of the specification below along with how we can support you with NHS goals. If you are in a devolved nation, consider the below as a quality improvement exercise.
Specification |
What we can offer |
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1. 75% cancers diagnosed |
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2. Address health inequalities |
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3. Use insightful analytics |
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4. Improve data recording and use, including ethnicity |
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5. Improve outcomes |
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6. Review cancer referral |
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7. To address health |
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For support and advice contact us today |
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Men want to know about the benefits of early diagnosis
Prostate cancer is different from other cancers as early, curable prostate cancer does not normally cause symptoms. This is why we advocate risk awareness, and informing men about what they can do about it.
Our recent research published in June 2024, in the British Journal of General Practioners found that men want to know about the benefits of what an earlier diagnosis means, in order to value and appreciate the difference it’ll make to their survival rates. It’s important, therefore to provide men with accurate, balanced and non-biased information so that they can make informed decisions about their health.
The below shows demonstrates the changing survival rates based on 5 year and 10 year data and highlights the importance of finding men before their cancer progresses to later stages.
What is clear, is that men diagnosed earlier have better survival rates than those diagnosed later. The current evidence cites that only about half of prostate cancers are caught early.
Recommendation
To have any hope of meeting the UK’s ambitions of diagnosing 75% of all cancers at stage-1 or 2 by 2028, as outlined in the NHS Long Term Plan, men at risk need to be told about their risk of being diagnosed with prostate cancer and to understand the benefits of an earlier diagnoses.
Insightful analytics and data recording
The recent NHS statement on health inequalities in November 2023, highlighted the role that Integrated Care Boards in England have in collecting data to support targeted work to address health inequalities. Furthermore, the 2025/26 PCN DES specification also requests more data-set recording, including ethnicity. This data capture will help to inform action around future health inequalities and targeted messaging to specific groups.
There are a number of quality improvement activities that we’ve outlined for you below to help achieve this, which devolved nations can also adopt.
1. Start recording family history of prostate, breast and ovarian cancer and any genetic variation, as this is crucial information in understanding and recognising the increased risk of prostate cancer diagnosis.
2. Secondly, implement an agreed standardised ethnicity coding within your practice area/PCN/ICB so that auditing of patients of certain ethnicities becomes easier and will help to inform project work. We provide some suggestions further on.
3. If your practice is an iPlato or accuRx user, you can also text patients an ethnicity questionnaire, which when completed will be automatically coded into their records.
TRANSFORM screening trial
Our TRANSFORM screening study is a large-scale, national trial involving hundreds of thousands of men, investigating different screening approaches for prostate cancer. It will produce the definitive evidence needed to support a prostate cancer screening programme in the UK. Our recruitment to TRANSFORM has begun in 2025 and part of this set up involves identifying suitable primary and secondary care sites across the UK to take part in the study.
If you’re interested in finding out more about how to get involved, please get in touch.
Practical go to
Practical guidance on risk awareness work.
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Projects and Support
If you require support in setting up your project then please contact us.
Educational support – find out about courses, CPD, resources.
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