Issues in referral
All sarcoma patients should have their care co-ordinated or discussed by one of the Sarcoma Specialist Centres. The first step towards this is when people with suspected sarcomas are referred to specialist centres when there is concern or ambiguity on their first diagnostic tests.
Problems with ultrasound and x-ray scanning and reading means that many patients with no potential signs of sarcoma are referred to specialist centres, leaving the diagnostic teams there with a huge number of patients.
What are we doing?
Each of the specialist centres have their own requirements for which tests are needed before they can be referred. In some cases, patients are referred to these centres with no tests at all. This means that sarcoma centres are spending their time ruling out sarcoma, but are unable to triage patients to focus on those with the highest need.
We hope that by improving the quality of scanning and reporting, and by setting a minimum level of tests before referral to sarcoma specialist centres, sarcoma centres are able to triage patients based on urgency, as well as de-escalating those who are benign, making the most of valuable clinic resource.
Our Expert Steering Group will work with the Sarcoma Advisory Group Chairs to map what information is currently required by each specialist centre, bring together specialist radiology leads to to understand potential requirements.
“By working with the sarcoma clinical community to improve referrals, we hope that those in the greatest need will be prioritised, allowing them to start treatment as quickly as possible.”
– Bradley Price, Policy & Public Affairs Manager
“By working with the sarcoma clinical community to improve referrals, we hope that those in the greatest need will be prioritised, allowing them to start treatment as quickly as possible.”
– Bradley Price, Policy & Public Affairs Manager
