The Christchurch Cancer Foundation will today seek support for a purpose built, Comprehensive Cancer Centre from the Canterbury District Health Board at its monthly board meeting.

It says its proposal would drastically alter cancer care and survival rates, housing together clinical research, screening and treatment, attracting the best clinicians to New Zealand, and freeing up space in public hospitals.

Leading Christchurch colorectal surgeon, and TCCF Chair, Professor Frank Frizelle, said “many of us would like to think that New Zealand provides one of the highest standards of health care in the world. The reality, however, is that in our care of cancer patients, we have fallen badly behind”

“Cancer accounts for nearly one-third of all deaths in New Zealand. More people here are developing cancer – mainly because our population is growing and getting older. Over the decade to 2016, the number of New Zealanders diagnosed increased by 21%.”

“Until recently, New Zealand’s five-year survival rates had been similar to those of the United States, Canada, Australia, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. In New Zealand, however, our survival statistics are quickly becoming disgraceful.”

The Christchurch Cancer Foundation says the only way to advance New Zealand’s cancer care and correc declining health outcomes is to develop a Southern Comprehensive Cancer Centre located in Christchurch modelled on similar centres already delivering results overseas.

“This cancer care model, already in use around the world, improves patients’ survival by between 50% and 100%. It requires a change in both philosophy, which we have seen with the government’s launch of the Cancer Control Agency, as well as in the model we use to deliver care.”

A Southern Comprehensive Cancer Centre, servicing southern and central New Zealand, would stand outside the Canterbury District Health Board, but otherwise operate as a public hospital. All the existing cancer services currently provided by Christchurch Hospital, except for some very complex and acute cases, would be relocated to the Centre, freeing up around 35% of the valuable space within the existing Christchurch hospital, and other regional hospitals.