Hospitals trusts fail waiting times for bowel cancer tests

THERE ARE a total of 234 patients on the waiting list for a bowel cancer test in Portsmouth, and seven of those have been waiting six weeks or more, it has been revealed.

NHS England found 38 hospitals in the south of England do not meet the NHS standard of less than one per cent of patients waiting more than six weeks for a colonoscopy, and flexible sigmoidoscopy – a camera on a thin, flexible cable inserted through the anus to look at different parts of the bowel.

Both are collectively known as an endoscopy.

The percentage of people waiting six weeks or more for a colonoscopy in Portsmouth is three, but there is nobody waiting that long for a flexible sigmoidoscopy.

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At Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, 187 patients have been waiting longer than six weeks for a colonoscopy.

Asha Kaur, from Bowel Cancer UK, said: ‘If hospitals are expected to meet targets they must be given the resources and capacity to enable them to do so.’