Report: Cancer information services ‘must reach out to more’

The Irish Cancer Society is failing to reach people with low education levels, older people and immigrant populations, a report has found.

The report, commissioned by the charity, said most people who used cancer information services were highly educated, especially those using online services.

It recommended that the ICS identify innovative ways of accessing communities through outreach programmes, develop relationships with voluntary and sporting organisations and introduce mobile cancer information services.

ICS head of services, Donal Buggy, said the report found that those who used the information service were mostly women, Irish, middle class and educated.

“The reason we commissioned the report was to identify the communities that we are not currently serving and try to do better,” he said yesterday.

“We also need to figure out how we can engage with men on a more meaningful level. Men experience more cancer than women but only access 30% of our services,” Mr Buggy added.

The report also found that healthcare professionals working in primary and secondary care were slow to recommend the service to their patients.

Mr Buggy said they were surprised that healthcare professionals, particularly GPs and public health nurses did, not realise the range of services the ICS offered.

“We really need to do more to encourage those healthcare professionals to refer their cancer patents to our services,” he said.

The report found that some people only found out about the information service at the end of their cancer treatment.

“That’s disappointing for us because we would like to think that every cancer patient would be aware of the services we provide and the help and support that we can give,” said Mr Buggy.

• www.cancer.ie