SURVIVAL rates for cancer patients across Bradford district and Craven one year on from their diagnosis are rising, new figures show.

According to latest NHS data, 74.8 per cent of people diagnosed with cancer in 2020 in the former NHS Bradford District and Craven clinical commissioning group area survived the first year. The figure is up from 74.1 per cent in 2019, and compares to 69 per cent a decade earlier.

Nationally, the one-year survival rate reached 74.6 per cent in 2020 – up from 74.1 per cent the year before and 68.7 per cent in 2010.

Michelle Mitchell, chief executive of Cancer Research UK, says that despite the data showing improvements in cancer survival in England, there is still “unacceptable” disparity across the country.

She said: “Our chances of surviving cancer should not vary depending on where we live.”

The data also shows that the one-year survival rate for women with breast cancer in Bradford district and Craven increased from 96.1 per cent in 2010 to 97.4 per cent ten years later.

The survival rate for colorectal cancer patients also rose, from 78.8 per cent in 2010 to 84.5 per cent in 2020.

And for lung cancer patients there was an increase from 36.1 per cent in 2010 to 47.3 per cent a decade on.

Dr Himat Thandi, clinical cancer lead for Bradford District and Craven Integrated Care Board, says he is encouraged by the figures but warns there are still "a lot of challenges".

He said: "The board works with primary, community and secondary care on areas such as early diagnosis and treatment.

"We have a number of improvement projects focusing on healthy lives including stopping smoking and we work closely with our cancer screening programmes to help diagnose cancers early. For instance, we have successfully piloted a lung health check programme, designed to spot lung cancers at an earlier stage in thousands of smokers or ex-smokers in the region aged from 55 to 74 years of age.

"We are aware we still have a lot of challenges and health inequalities in the district and we're constantly developing plans and projects to focus on targeted areas to help our communities be as healthy as possible, raise public awareness of signs and symptoms of cancer and encourage more people to come forward for early diagnosis, which will help to have a better outcome and quality of life for patients."