IMPROVEMENTS in cancer treatment have led to a health trust needing less oversight from NHS England.

Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust had been among the trusts under the highest level of scrutiny by the national health body.

But in a meeting of Worcestershire County Council’s health overview and scrutiny committee, councillors were told of the progress that has been made in recent months.

This includes the start of a bowel cancer screening programme, work on a new database to underpin a cervical screening programme and the positive impact of the trust’s new Urology Intervention Unit in Redditch.

Stephen Collman, managing director of Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, told committee members: “When we last spoke we were in Tier 1 - those are the trusts NHS England are most worried about.

“And certainly for the past four months we’ve been dropped to Tier 2, so that’s a sign we’re progressing along that and we’re doing well.

“And we’re hopeful that in the next few months we’ll be able to drop out of the tiering process altogether.”

He said progress was also being made on referring patients to cancer specialists at neighbouring NHS trusts including in Warwickshire, Gloucestershire and Birmingham.

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Jade Brooks, director of operations and delivery at NHS Herefordshire and Worcestershire, added: “There are 10 trusts in Tier 1 and it’s supposed to be a supportive arrangement, so that we have access to national experts in cancer as well as the Department of Health, as well as trusts where they have done good work, so we learn from their good practice.

“A very heavy amount of time and scrutiny is placed when you’re in this tiering. So in Tier 1 you would meet these individuals every week and they would say ‘what is different from last week?’.

“Whereas Tier 2 is the recognition that you have made improvement. And it is now about ‘Can you sustain that improvement?’

“We’re fairly confident we won’t be in Tier 2 much longer.”