NHS patients miss out on cancer screening due to shortages

A shortage of chemicals that are used to detect prostate and bone tumors is putting patients at risk. This is due to the slowdown in imports, a lack of funding and the closure of vital labs.

This year, hospitals in Oxford, Bath, and London, among others, issued alerts about shortages radioactive materials, which resulted in scans being cancelled or delayed.

In one case, the delay of hundreds of urgent radiology scans was caused by two major UK labs – one located in Wales and another on England’s south coast – closing for three months.

Health chiefs warned that the combination of closures caused by a lack of funding and staff, along with faltering EU imports, has created a “perfect hurricane” of shortages.

Both Dr Katharine Haliday and Jilly Croasdale raised concerns.

is commonly used to detect and check for the spread of diseases like prostate cancer. NHS Data shows that more than 317,000 nuclear medicine tests of this type were performed by the NHS between 2023 and 2024.

In June of this year, the average wait time between a test request and its execution was 25 days. This is a slight improvement from January of last year when it was 28 days. The average test time before 2023 was 22 days.

In some hospitals, like The Royal Orthopaedic Hospital in London, University Hospital Southampton, and Harrogate District Hospital this year, the average testing time for a patient was more than 50 days. Alder Hey Children’s Hospital was one trust that hit 108.

Ms Croasdale is also the head of radiopharmacy at Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust and the associate director for healthcare science. She said that the delays left people waiting for weeks to know if their cancer has spread.

She explained: “The issue is that for every day you do not have a supply you already have your list booked up for however many more weeks.” Then you have to find the time to rebook the patients. This can take weeks due to the difficulty of rescheduling, and because the shortage lasted so long.

Ms Croasdale said that due to the shortages, patients who need urgent scans may face delays of up to a week. She said that although patients would be given clinical priority, a delay even of a month can mean that cancer has spread.

The answer is “yes” if they are urgent.

She said that if you delay something by four weeks, then it can take that long for an infection to spread. This information is crucial in determining how we will treat the patient.

The BNMS President also raised a concern about a material called prostate-specific antigen (PSMA) that is needed for prostate cancer scans. The lack of lab capacity to produce the material and NHS contracts in England that prioritize other types of scanning are to blame.

According to the BNMS head, “Supply [of PSMA] is extremely patchy …[ with] multiple cancellations throughout the country.”

The Oxford University Hospitals NHS foundation trust reported in May that there were problems with the PSMA supply, causing delays to scans for patients to determine if their prostate cancer has spread.

Royal United Hospitals Bath, in a separate report to the board this month warned that bone scanning for prostate cancer patients was being delayed because of a nationwide supply problem with PSMA.

In January, internal reports for hospitals in London warned about a “fragile stock of radionuclides”, a radioactive substance used in testing.

In a letter sent to members of the BNMS by Ms Croasdale, she said that some areas are facing a “perfectstorm” because regulators have to close labs necessary to create nuclear materials due to their inability to meet standards.

She wrote: “The nuclear medicine community has had a tough time in the last few month, which has had an adverse impact on some patients.”

Ms Croasdale said in some areas of the country there had been no supplies at all of a substance called Technetium-99m radiopharmaceuticals, radioactive materials needed for scans of body organs, for weeks and months.

Her warning was backed up by Dr Katharine Haliday, president of the Royal College of Radiologists. She said: “We fully support efforts to tackle the root causes of the crisis, which include improving radiopharmacy facilities and increasing the workforce’s capacity.

“Collaborative actions are critical for ensuring reliable and consistent access to these resources. We stand ready to work with BNMS and NHS England as well as other key stakeholders to resolve the issue and ensure patient care going forward.”

Chiara DeBiase is the director of health services at Prostate Cancer UK. She said that although not all men will be affected, this supply problem has affected some men who have recurrent prostate carcinoma.

Due to the shortage of scans, these men were unable get the scans that they needed so their cancer could be imaged and the right treatment plan progressed. The reports are coming from various sites in the UK. Men have been left waiting while their treatment has been delayed. “We sincerely hope that these problems are resolved as quickly as possible.”

In 2019 and after Brexit, the UK also faced shortages. The NHS is vulnerable to global supply problems because there are no facilities to produce radioactive starter materials in the UK.

Both the BNMS (British National Medical Society) and Royal College of Radiologists (RCR) have also cited a shortage of radiologists.

A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said: “The NHS has broken down.” We are determined to make sure that all patients receive the care they deserve.

“Our mission is to save the NHS, which includes doubling the amount of MRI and CT scans. We will also tackle the chronic shortages in the workforce that the health service has been facing for years.

“This government has inherited a number of ongoing global supply issues, and we work closely with industry and partners, including the NHS, manufacturers, and others, to resolve these problems as quickly as possible.”