Cancer Services profiles

The Cancer Services profiles tool on Fingertips provides data for a number of indicators focussed on cancer-related activity relevant to primary care. The profiles have been designed to support commissioners and health professionals to assess the impact of cancer on their local population and make decisions about services.

These profiles present data by general practitioner (GP) practice, primary care network (PCN), sub-Integrated Care Board (sub-ICB), Integrated Care Board (ICB) and at a national level on:

• cancer incidence
• cancer screening
• urgent suspected cancer (USC) referrals
• diagnostic services
• emergency presentations
• emergency admissions

Acknowledgements

This work uses data that has been provided by patients and collated by the NHS as part of their care and support. It is sourced from NHS England and collated, maintained and quality assured by the National Disease Registration Service, which is part of NHS England.

Indicators

The Cancer Services profiles on Fingertips provide 31 indicators, split into two topics. These are:

Demographic, Screening and Diagnostics

• proportion of GP registered populations by age group (65+ yrs)
• deprivation score (IMD 2019)
• new cancer cases (crude incidence rates)
• cancer: QOF prevalence (all ages)

Screening

• breast screening coverage: aged 53 to 70 years old
• breast screening uptake: aged 50 to 70 years old
• cervical screening coverage: aged 25 to 49 years old
• cervical screening coverage: aged 50 to 64 years old
• bowel cancer screening coverage: aged 60 to 74 years old
• bowel cancer screening uptake: aged 60 to 74 years old

Diagnostic procedures

• in-patient or day-case lower GI endoscopy procedures
• in-patient or day-case upper GI endoscopy procedures

Emergency activity

• emergency admissions with cancer
• emergency presentations
• other (non-emergency) presentations

Urgent suspected cancer referrals

Annual data

• urgent suspected cancer referrals
• urgent suspected cancer referrals (Indirectly age-gender standardised referral ratio)
• urgent suspected cancer referrals resulting in a diagnosis of cancer (Conversion rate: as % of all USC referrals)
• new cancer cases treated resulting from an urgent suspected cancer referral (Detection rate: % of all new cancer cases treated)
• urgent suspected cancer referrals for suspected breast cancer
• urgent suspected cancer referrals for suspected lower GI cancer
• urgent suspected cancer referrals for suspected lung cancer
• urgent suspected cancer referrals for suspected skin cancer

Five-years combined data

• urgent suspected cancer referrals. Five years combined data
• urgent suspected cancer referrals (Indirectly age-gender standardised referral ratio). Five years combined data
• urgent suspected cancer referrals resulting in a diagnosis of cancer (Conversion rate: as % of all USC referrals). Five years combined data
• new cancer cases treated resulting from an urgent suspected cancer referral (Detection rate: % of all new cancer cases treated). Five years combined data
• urgent suspected cancer referrals for suspected breast cancer. Five years combined data
• urgent suspected cancer referrals for suspected lower GI cancer. Five years combined data
• urgent suspected cancer referrals for suspected lung cancer. Five years combined data
• urgent suspected cancer referrals for suspected skin cancer. Five years combined data

For each indicator, further information on specific indicator methodology, confidence intervals and additional caveats can be found in the 'Definitions' view on Fingertips.

Data sources

• National Cancer Registration Dataset, NHS England
• Hospital Episode Statistics, NHS England
• Cancer Waiting Times, NHS England
• Breast Screening Programme, NHS England
• Bowel Screening Programme, NHS England
• Cervical Screening Programme, NHS England
• Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF), Patients registered at a GP practice and GP patient survey (GPPS)

GP practice inclusion criteria

Cancer Services profiles are generated each year for all GP practices that were active in that financial year with a list size of 750 or more patients. It was assumed that a practice was 'active' if there is either a record for it in the Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF) data for that financial year and/or it both is included in the Patients Registered at a GP practice publication for the April of that year and has a valid GP patient survey data for that year.

Data for geographies other than GP practices are calculated based on aggregating data for all relevant GP practices, except for the sub-ICB, ICB and national data for the six screening indicators.

Prior to the 2022 to 2023 financial year, GP practices were only included with a list size of 1,000 or more patients, along with the other criteria, and the screening indicator data were restricted by the GP practice restriction criteria for all geographies.

Populations used for PCN, sub-ICB, ICB and national data are based on the GP practices included in the profiles.

Disclosure control methods

Some disclosure control methods have been applied to the screening indicators to ensure that the data match other publications. These methods are:

• for breast and bowel screening indicator data from the 2022 to 2023 financial year onwards and cervical screening indicator data from the 2023 to 2024 financial year onwards, a Central Suppression Methodology has been applied to round values of between 0 and 7 to 5, and values above 7 to the nearest 5. This is applied to geographies on an individual basis, so values are based on aggregated unrounded data.
• for cervical screening indicator data for the 2022 to 2023 financial year, all counts of between 0 and 5 are suppressed, with secondary suppression if required.

There is no disclosure control applied to the other indicators.

The Cancer Services profiles are updated on an annual basis, with new data generally published in early December.

To download data from the Cancer Services profiles on Fingertips, choose the indicator and geography of interest, and change 'Data view' to 'Download'. There are a variety of options on this page for downloading data as a CSV file.

Fingertips also has an API that allows data to be downloaded through R or Python.

The data for the tool is collated by the National Disease Registration Service (NDRS) and the tool is maintained by the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID), Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC). Please send any questions or feedback regarding the Cancer Services profiles to [email protected].