Cancer waiting times
1 October to 31 December 2023

About this release

This release by Public Health Scotland (PHS) presents the quarterly update of Cancer Waiting Times statistics, reporting two National Standards on how long patients waited for their first cancer treatment. This release covers patients who started their first treatment by quarter ending 31 December 2023.

Main points

Line graph showing the percentage of patients that were treated within both the 31- and 62-day standards by quarter (Q4 2012-Q1 2013, Q1 2019-Q4 2023). Data for the 31- and 62-day standards are shown in different colours.

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NHS Scotland performance against the 62-day and 31-day standards

Note that the x-axis has been abridged, with a jump between Q1 2013 and Q1 2019; the unabridged version can be found in the full report.

The 62-day standard states that 95% of eligible patients should wait no longer than 62 days from urgent suspicion of cancer referral to first cancer treatment.

• There were 4,457 eligible referrals for the 62-day standard, a decrease of 3.6% from the previous quarter, and an increase of 19.7% from the quarter ending 31 December 2019.
• 71.1% of patients started treatment within the 62-day standard, compared with 71.9% in the previous quarter, and 83.7% in the quarter ending 31 December 2019.

The 62-day standard was met by 1 of the 15 NHS Boards: NHS Orkney.

The 31-day standard states that 95% of eligible patients should wait no longer than 31 days from decision to treat to first cancer treatment.

• There were 6,829 eligible referrals for the 31-day standard, a decrease of 5% from the previous quarter, and an increase of 6.9% from the quarter ending 31 December 2019.
• 94.1% of patients started treatment within the 31-day standard, compared with 94.9% in the previous quarter, and 96.5% in the quarter ending 31 December 2019.

The 31-day standard was met by 8 of the 15 NHS Boards: Golden Jubilee National Hospital, NHS Ayrshire & Arran, NHS Borders, NHS Dumfries & Galloway, NHS Forth Valley, NHS Orkney, NHS Shetland, NHS Western Isles.

Background

Current standards for cancer waiting times are that 95% of all eligible patients should wait no longer than 31 or 62 days (Action Plan), with 5% tolerance level due to clinical appropriateness.

The 62-day standard applies to patients urgently referred with a suspicion of cancer by a primary care clinician/general dental physician, patients referred by one of the national cancer screening programmes, and direct referrals to hospital where the signs and symptoms are consistent with the cancer diagnosed, as per the Scottish Referral Guidelines e.g. self-referral to A&E.

The 31-day standard applies to all patients, regardless of the route of referral.

Many Boards have highlighted that staffing issues combined with a high number of referrals continue to limit capacity and impact on performance in the latest quarter.

Further information

The next release of this publication will be 25 June 2024.

NHS Performs

A selection of information from this publication is included in NHS Performs. NHS Performs is a website that brings together a range of information on how hospitals and NHS Boards within NHSScotland are performing.