North Wales Assembly Member Mark Isherwood has called on the Welsh Government to listen to the calls of Prostate Cancer UK and provide radiology units with the resources they need to ensure every man who could benefit from the Prostate MRI scan can get one.
Calling for a Welsh Government Statement on the extent of Prostate Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) before biopsy across Wales during yesterday’s Business Statement, Mr Isherwood said while progress has been made in providing the Prostate MR before biopsy, further action is still required.
Speaking in the Welsh Parliament, he said:
“Prostate Cancer UK has shared its latest Freedom of Information request data showing the extent of prostate MRI before biopsy across Wales. This found that three out of seven Health Boards across Wales are not yet providing the scans to the standards set by the PROMIS trial and recommended by NICE (the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence). A further two are offering bi-parametric MRI, a simplified version of the scans, although they (Prostate Cancer UK) say plans are in place to complete the process of ensuring that all areas are providing access to full multiparametic MRI by 1 April, only a matter of weeks ahead.
“They also found that there were restrictive eligibility criteria in Abertawe Bro Morgannwg University Health Board and Cwm Taf University Health Board, and that the increase in prostate MRI capacity over the previous 12 months was unknown in both Betsi Cadwaladr and Cwm Taf University Health Boards.
“Prostate Cancer UK is therefore calling for radiology units to receive the resources they need to ensure every man who could benefit gets access now, and has developed a planning tool to help health providers calculate the increase in resources they will need to plan for in their areas. I call for a Statement accordingly, not to criticise, but to seek a way of closing the gap in the bridge, which is a smaller bridge, but action is nonetheless still required”.
The Trefnydd Rebecca Evans AM told Mr Isherwood that the Health Minister intends to bring forward a statement on the Cancer Strategy in due course.
ENDS
