Social Challenge Increasing early presentation rates of breast, lung and bowel cancer in Stoke-on-Trent

Collaborators NHS Stoke-on-Trent , Improvement Foundation , Healthy Communities Collaborative, Community Volunteers, residents of Stoke, local businesses

Before Older residents in Stoke-on-Trent were delaying visiting health professionals with the signs and symptoms of breast, lung and bowel cancer due to:
- Poor awareness and knowlegde of symptoms
- Busy lives and routines, making health a low priority
- A belief that cancer was not treatable

Approach Uscreates researchers spoke to residents in Stoke-on-Trent, who were over forty, to gain a deep understanding of their opinions, attitudes and knowledge of breast, lung and bowel cancer.

We supported the community team to conduct interviews with their friends and family using ‘Interview Toolkits’. These interviews fed into the findings from the researchers.

The interviews with residents informed the design of a social marketing programme involving local cancer survivors in communicating the campaign message Get Checked Today to Enjoy Tomorrow.

Methods: Link Tracing, Interview Toolkits, Focus Groups, In-depth Interviews, Co-design Workshop, Pre-testing

Change and Success- Care and Share toolkits have been distributed amongst Community Volunteers to support their role to raise awareness about the benefits of early detection.
- Over 30 pharmacists have attended a cancer awareness training session
- The impact of the programme is being independently evaluated. Baseline presentation rates have been gathered and will be compared rates following introduction of interventions.

Find out more:
Visit the Stoke Cancer Awareness Project Blog
Visit the campaign website
Watch a highlight film about the project on Youtube
See more project photos on Flickr