Striking nurses warn NHS cancer patients who wait hours for chemo due to lack of staff.

Cancer patients typically face “ridiculous” waiting hours for chemotherapy in hospitals, striking nurses warn.

Nurses caring for cancer patients showed up from the picketers I They felt the need to go on strike as they saw that treatment was regularly delayed or canceled on non-strike days and wanted better care for those in need.

Thousands of Royal College of Nursing (RCN) nurses from more than 55 NHS trusts in England went on strike for the second day in a row over wages on Thursday. Two more dates were announced for February 6 and 7, the first of which coincided with the ambulance strikes.

Nearly 30,000 surgeries and appointments had to be postponed after the December strike, and thousands more are expected to be canceled during this week’s action.

The Royal College of Nursing and NHS England have agreed that unions and local hospital foundations should work together to provide a “life-saving model of care” where essential treatments such as chemotherapy continue during strikes.

But oncology nurses in the London pickets say cancer treatment is usually delayed or canceled on non-strike days.

Emma Ings, 52, told a nurse who was demonstrating outside University College London Hospital. I: “The waiting time just for treatment is ridiculous because there is not enough staff… It’s an hour, two hours, three hours for her chemo.

“They wait for every outpatient appointment, every treatment, every blood transfusion.”

She said that the mood in the hospitals was high due to the delays and the atmosphere was “tense”. “People are angry, and rightly so, they are tired of waiting. I often see nurses crying, it’s unbearable,” she said.

Ms Ings, who has worked as a nurse for 30 years, said the range of cancer treatments is expanding, but staff shortages are hindering service delivery. The day care oncology center where she worked is fully staffed.

Eleanor Ferguson, 35, also a cancer nurse who was picketing outside University College London, said the NHS was “strangled” and unable to meet the needs of patients.

“The staff is tired and you have to make sacrifices – you sacrifice patient care, you sacrifice the well-being of your colleagues, or you sacrifice yourself – and you always choose yourself,” Ms Ferguson said. I.

Chukvudubem Ifeayouna, 43, head of clinical nursing at Bognor Regis War Memorial Hospital, also described how “things can go wrong” when nurses work in rooms they’re not used to due to lack of staff.

He said that these nurses would have to ask for help from other staff, which would slow down processes and put additional strain on the entire team.

“Stress sets in and makes the day miserable,” he said. “We are all under pressure. It’s not just about payment, it’s about patient safety.”

Waiting times for cancer treatment in November 2022 were among the worst on record, with just 61% of people starting cancer treatment within 62 days of an urgent referral, according to Cancer Research UK. This means that about 6,400 people who started treatment in November had to wait more than two months to start cancer treatment.

The proportion of patients waiting more than 104 days after an urgent referral to start cancer treatment was 12.4% of patients – about 2,000 people – in November 2022. This is the second highest figure since June 2015, according to Cancer Research UK.

Sunita Tind, 40, who has ovarian cancer, recently shared I In December, two key follow-up appointments in Birmingham, including an assessment of her cancer remission, were cancelled. “I sympathize with the nurses and doctors, they are great, but it won’t really work until these things are canceled and they don’t say when they will be postponed,” she said.

NHS England did not respond to questions about delays in cancer treatment when asked for comment.