26.03.12
Great expectations
Discrimination in the health service can lead to significant consequences in terms of mortality, the level of treatment provided and overall care. Today, Macmillan has criticised the NHS for its ageism towards cancer patients, citing that mortality rates are not improving as quickly as those for younger patients.
Some of the issues they raise, such as generating generic treatment plans based purely on age, lack of support for the uptake of treatment and knowledge of age-related separate health problems, could clearly benefit from better training for doctors and an improved system of support.
Refusing someone treatment based on their age is shameful and cannot continue.
Yet the rate of mortality is always going to be higher in the elderly. It is not surprising that this is improving less quickly than the rate for young people, aside from doctors’ performance, the young are generally healthier overall and more likely to respond positively to treatment.
This is not to say that there cannot be improvements in the care and treatment provided to elderly cancer patients, but to expect significantly higher and faster improvements is to ignore the host of additional issues that elderly patients present.
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