Canada Has High Ranking In Survival Rates For Certain Cancers

A comparison of cancer survival rates in six developed countries puts Canada in the top three alongside Australia and Sweden, and ahead of Norway, Denmark and the U.K.

The study, initiated in the United Kingdom and published online Tuesday in The Lancet, examined survival rates for breast, lung, colorectal and ovarian cancer in 12 jurisdictions in the six countries.

“The main reason to look at these countries in relation to us is that they’re countries of comparable wealth and very good quality information on cancer incidence, mortality and survival,” said Terrence Sullivan, president and CEO of Cancer Care Ontario.

“The value for us is really to see how we’re doing as a benchmark with the other jurisdictions.”

Altogether, the study involved data for 2.4 million adults diagnosed with primary cancer from 1995 to 2007. The four Canadian provinces that provided information were Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba and Ontario.

Senior author Dr. Heather Bryant described the findings as good news for Canadians.

“What’s been found is there really is a difference across the countries, and that Canada and Australia and Sweden really came out faring the best for five-year survival, which of course is very good news for cancer patients here.”

Bryant, vice-president of Cancer Control at the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer, said investigators in the U.K. began the project after finding that their cancer survival rates were not as high as a lot of others in western Europe.

They wanted further comparisons with other countries with similar economic systems and health systems with universal coverage in an attempt to tease out the differences.

Further analysis is being done to look at whether there are differences among the countries related to the stage of cancer at time of diagnosis, she indicated.

Cancer survival is improving in all countries for the four cancers studied, but there are some marked differences among jurisdictions, she noted.

“Our lung cancer rates, although we would all agree that an 18 per cent five-year survival is very low, it actually is quite a bit better than other comparison countries,” she said from Calgary.

“In Australia, which is one of the other top countries, it’s at 17 per cent; 16 per cent in Sweden — but it drops down to about eight to nine per cent in the U.K.”

“And so even though we’re struggling with our lung cancer survival rates, it’s good to know that we’re doing world-class treatment here.”

Colon cancer five-year survival rates have gone up in Canada, and further rises are expected, she said.

“We know that colorectal cancer screening programs are rolling out across the country, and we expect to see some pretty sharp increases in survival as we start seeing people get detected earlier and earlier with cancer.”

Sullivan said more can be done in Canada to detect early stage lung cancer and treat it aggressively, and to improve the participation of women in breast cancer screening.

He described it as “great news” that Canada is among the global leaders in cancer survival.

“I think it’s because we have well-structured, well-organized approaches to cancer control, both provincially and nationally in Canada,” he said.

“Even with that there is room to gain yards, particularly in the breast and colon cancer area with respect to screening participation, in lung cancer with respect to earlier disease investigation, and ovarian with respect to better diagnosis and subspecialty management once we’ve identified cancer.”