Fears over ovarian cancer sufferers
Updated on 29 June 2009
Lives may be lost because ovarian cancer is misunderstood and mistaken for bowel problems, a report said.
Confused GPs send women for tests for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and by the time the error is discovered their cancer is often terminal, according to researchers.
Some women may be dying "unnecessarily" of the deadliest gynaecological cancer because their diagnosis takes too long, they said.
If sufferers are diagnosed at an early stage 90% could survive, but three quarters of women are currently diagnosed with cancer which has already spread.
Ovarian cancer affects 6,800 women each year and only 30% survive five more years.
This survival rate is one of the lowest in Europe and has not improved in three decades, unlike the rate for breast cancer which has grown from 50% to 80% in the same period.
Target Ovarian Cancer, the charity behind the study - intended to be the most comprehensive mapping of the disease ever in the UK - said ovarian cancer has been "under-funded, ill understood and neglected" compared to other cancers.
Of 400 GPs surveyed, around 80% wrongly thought women with early stage ovarian cancer had no symptoms and only a minority (27%) knew of guidelines stating what they should watch out for.
More than two thirds (69%) seemed unaware that women with ovarian cancer were more likely to experience sudden and persistent symptoms than women with IBS.
When asked what other diagnosis they had made when a woman presented with symptoms, seven out of 16 GPs replied IBS.
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