Saving lives in Swindon through lung cancer health checks

An NHS lung health check service is inviting past and current smokers in Swindon for scans to save lives and improve rates of diagnosis.

The scheme is targeting 43 areas with the highest mortality rates for lung cancer in England, including Swindon.

As we mark the national quit smoking campaign, Stoptober, the Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust is fully supporting this initiative.

Having begun earlier this year, the initiative is going to invite more than 23,000 past and current smokers aged 55 to 74 in Swindon will be invited to a lung health check by their GP over the next 2 years.

This community initiative gives patients a better chance of beating cancer by diagnosing it earlier. People diagnosed with lung cancer at the earliest stage are nearly 20 times more likely to survive for five years than those whose cancer is caught late.

The lung health check takes place in two stages. The first is an initial phone assessment with a specially trained health care professional. If the assessment finds the person to be at high risk, they are offered a low dose CT scan of the lungs for further investigation.

The scanner is housed in a mobile unit located in the Asda car park in West Swindon.

Lung cancer can often be caught too late as there are rarely obvious symptoms at the earlier stages. The programme is designed to check those most at risk of developing lung cancer to spot signs earlier, at the stage when it’s much more treatable and ultimately saving more lives.

Head of Cancer Services for the Trust, Stephen Hambley, says:

“To date, more than 19,000 local people have been invited for a telephone health check and more than four thousand CT scans have taken place. So far, this important project has identified twenty people with cancer. We’re doing this while also encouraging people across Swindon to give up smoking. Attending your Targeted Lung Health Check if you are invited for one could save your life, so please do attend if you are invited to do so.”

For more information on the Targeted Lung Health Check programme please visit https://bsw.icb.nhs.uk/your-health/which-nhs-service-should-i-use/nhs-lung-health-checks/