Question reference: S6W-24556
- Asked by: Sue Webber, MSP for Lothian, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
- Date lodged: 17 January 2024
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Current status: Answered by Michael Matheson on 25 January 2024
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what it is doing to urgently provide equitable access to prehabilitation, especially for patients with a less survivable cancer.
Answer
The Cancer Action Plan 2023-2026 sets out our ambitious programme of work to ensure access to cancer prehabilitation.
The Scottish Government is working with experts across health and social care to ensure timely access to all services providing the multi-modal, tiered and personalised interventions that make up prehabilitation. This includes developing the frameworks to screen, assess and signpost people affected by cancer to the relevant services as soon as possible. A national website has been created in partnership with those with lived experience to provide universal and accessible information and advice. A new primary care cancer education platform for NHS Scotland that will feature prehabilitation advice will also go live early 2024 to enable effective decision-making and support earlier diagnosis efforts.
Prehabilitation is a key part of the Optimal Cancer Diagnostic Pathways and Clinical Management Pathways (CMPs) that have been developed for Lung Cancer and the CMP for Adult Brain Cancers, also in development. The Scottish Government has also provided £350,000 to develop and implement universal prehabilitation workshops for the Maggie’s Centres. Further funding has been allocated to support each board area to adopt the nationally provided tools to reinforce care pathways, directly benefiting those affected by cancer, including less survivable cancers.