Health teams in Teesside who have come together over the last decade to transform cancer services have been recognised with regional honours.
The services from both North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust and South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust have been presented with the Northern Cancer Alliance Award.
They first came together 12 years ago to overcome potential challenges with diagnosing and treating more complex suspected lung cancers.
The respiratory team at North Tees and Hartlepool started performing what is known as navigational bronchoscopy – using very small flexible cameras and ultrasound through the lungs to reach smaller airways.
Working closely with staff across both organisations in respiratory, biomedical science, thoracic anaesthetists and the surgical team, radiographers and endoscopy teams, the service has been successful in finding more small abnormal areas in the lungs which may be cancerous.
Respiratory consultants Vandana Jeebun, Julia Dunleavy and Victor Chew attended an awards ceremony last week to accept the award.
Respiratory teams have come together
Dr Jeebun said: “All those years ago the team recognised the likely challenges they were going to face in the future to find these harder to reach suspected cancers in the lungs.
“They came together as a respiratory community, working with health experts across both health trusts who had incredible perseverance, commitment and drive, to become one of the first services in the UK to run something like this.
“The teams showed significant dedication towards training and education of staff so we could increase our capacity to match the rapidly rising demands.
“Everyone involved should be really proud of what we have collectively achieved.”
“Thanks to them, the service has helped diagnose many patients with early stage lung cancer that, without this service, may have needed more invasive tests with higher risks.
“Without it, patients may have been left waiting for subsequent further investigations only when issues had progressed, potentially causing more harm.”
Finding cancers more easily
The service works with radiology and cardiothoracic (chest) surgical teams to ensure the right patients are chosen for the procedures.
And biomedical scientists attend every patient procedure so clinicians know whether cancer cells have been found or not.
Dr Jeebun continued: “This joined up working means we can diagnose patients during their procedure and there is no delay.
“We are also able to place gold markers that allow surgeons to cut out less of the lung due to more easily finding the cancers.
“It is now really important we build on this success – involving even more staff and teams and investing more so we continue to diagnose more cancers and save more lives.”
The team have also shared their expertise with other NHS trusts across the North East.
Dr Chew added: “Our region has one of the highest rates of smoking and lung cancer nationally – so to be able to share our learning and train other health staff in the region is really significant and means patients get the same treatment wherever they live.
“In light of the fact we also have seen a rise in patients being referred to our service – a result of very successful lung cancer screening programmes – it is important we continue to grow the service, diagnose more cancer faster and keep up with the rising demand so that more patients can be treated at an early stage in a timely manner.”