The already grim health condition of cancer patients in the United Kingdom is apparently worsened by the "lack of compassion" by healthcare service providers, a report from the one of the country's leading cancer support charity says.
Macmillan Cancer Support, which provides specialist healthcare and financial support to cancer patients in Britain, said that cancer patients in the UK die too soon as they are refused access to breakthrough drugs and treatment. It also pointed out that thousands of cancer patients get diagnosed too late which reduces their chances to be successfully treated.
In its first "state of the nation report," the charity said that a quarter of patients in the UK are only informed they have cancer after an emergency admission to the hospital and patients diagnosed in this manner are twice as likely to die within a year as patients who have been referred to the hospital.
Macmillan also said that there is a worrying lack of compassion from health workers and described this lack of care and poor survival rate among cancer patients as a "national shame." The charity said that one in five cancer patients feel like a "set of symptoms" rather than a person and that 17 percent of patients claim that their doctors spoke to them as if they were not there.
The charity is also concerned about the survival rate of patients with breast, colorectal, lung and ovarian cancers as UK has one of the lowest survival rates for these diseases compared with comparable countries such as Sweden, Australia, Canada, Denmark and Norway
Macmillan also said that the patients' chances of getting cured depends on their age and where they live as these are factors considered by healthcare providers to determine a patient's likelihood of getting offered the best treatment possible. Even in death, the patients are not given the right to die at home.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health said that the government has invested £750 million to improve the outlook of cancer patients and cancer survival rates in the country. Still Macmillan appears discontented with these efforts.
"While the NHS does amazing things every day, it is a national shame that our cancer survival rates are among the worst in Europe, that patients are being treated with a lack of dignity, or being denied a 'good' death," Macmillan chief executive Ciarán Devane said.
