More patients with oesophageal and gastric cancers are getting curative treatment plans

The proportion of patients with oesophageal and gastric cancers in England and Wales who have curative treatment plans has increased in the past six years, but one in six is still diagnosed only after emergency admission to hospital, an audit has shown.1

Cancers of the oesophagus and stomach are the fifth most common cancers in the United Kingdom, but prognosis remains poor because many patients experience symptoms only when their disease is fairly advanced, so it is diagnosed at a late stage. The five …