Row as private sector cancer centre announced for Wales
Martin Shipton
An international private healthcare provider has announced plans to open a purpose-built cancer centre in Wales – but a campaign group backed by NHS doctors claim it will only benefit a small, wealthy elite.
The Icon Group insists the new centre in Newport will expand regional oncology capacity in an area where demand for cancer services continues to grow.
The multi-million-pound investment will, says Icon, bring the former Rutherford Health facility back into operation, with capacity to support NHS systems and reduce travel burdens for private patients, thus strengthening regional radiotherapy and oncology services.
Reopening the centre, located at Celtic Springs, Coedkernew, Newport, will serve a general population catchment of around 1.4 million people across south Wales, says Icon.
Across the UK, one in two people will be diagnosed with cancer, and around half of all cancer patients are expected to require radiotherapy as part of their treatment. In Wales, the latest official cancer incidence data shows there were 21,006 new cancer cases in 2022, higher than the pre-pandemic annual average of 20,472 cases.
Icon says it will also reopen former Rutherford Health centres in Northumberland and Thames Valley as part of its commitment to bringing cancer care closer to home across the UK.
The Icon Cancer Centre South Wales will bring world-class radiotherapy, systemic anti-cancer therapy (SACT) – including chemotherapy, immunotherapy and targeted therapy, imaging and consulting services to patients across south Wales and will have capacity to treat more than 500 patients a year.
These services will be delivered, says Icon, by a highly skilled multidisciplinary team of up to 30 professionals across radiotherapy, radiography, medical physics, oncology nursing, pharmacy and administration drawing on Icon’s global workforce as well as creating opportunities for those in the region.
Mark Middleton, CEO of Icon Group, said: “The number of people being diagnosed with cancer continues to rise and there is a clear need to deliver the best cancer care possible, closer to home.
“Icon has a strong track record of investing responsibly in the UK to expand access to lifesaving cancer care, working in partnership with local health ecosystems in a way that genuinely supports local people.
“Healthcare infrastructure is a valuable community asset, and our focus is on ensuring that important cancer care facilities continue to serve the people who rely on them.
“This centre represents an opportunity to restore critical cancer infrastructure in Newport, ensuring we deliver sustainable, high-quality care for the community that depends on it.”
The centre in Newport has been designed to deliver high-quality, patient-centred cancer care, supported by the latest advanced technology and AI-enabled workflows that help clinicians plan and deliver more precise radiotherapy treatment. With this infrastructure and technology, Icon says it will support personalised care for patients, including faster treatment planning, improved accuracy and, where clinically appropriate, fewer treatment sessions.
‘Radiotherapy’
Dr Penny Kechagioglou, Chief Medical Officer, Icon UK, said:“Every patient is different, so our emphasis is on delivering care that is carefully coordinated, clinically led and centred on the individual.
“Radiotherapy is a vital part of cancer treatment but underutilised in the UK. Bringing these assets back online creates more access for cancer patients needing life-saving therapy.
“Every patient with cancer should have access to the right treatment at the right time and as close to home as possible. Bringing this centre back into use will help make that a reality for more people.”
Reopening the three Rutherford Health facilities builds on Icon’s acquisition of Cancer Centre London, now operating as Icon Cancer Centre London.The group is also progressing new centres in Brighton, Derbyshire and Warwickshire, alongside a proposed centre in Leeds as part of a wider health initiative at AMT Headingley Stadium.
‘Wealthy elite’
But a spokesperson for the campaign group Colocate Velindre, which argued for a new NHS cancer centre in south east Wales to be built adjacent to a district general hospital and whose supporters include many NHS clinicians, said: “The proposed centre looks like it will serve only a wealthy elite since cancer treatments are particularly expensive, and oversight of an overarching cancer pathway additionally so. This elite is not a large consumer group in Wales.
“If, as appears so far, innovative contracts with the Welsh Government are lacking, the new facility seems only minimally able to help the greater majority of cancer patients in Wales.
“The Icon Group’s first cancer centre in the UK is co-located with an NHS general hospital doing surgery (Nuffield Health Parkside Hospital). But Wales, it appears, can only expect a standalone centre lacking these surgical services and acute back-up on site. The Nuffield Advice (2020), however, considered such provision absolutely necessary due to ever more toxic cancer treatments ahead. Only the unreadiness of University Hospital of Wales stood in the way of the colocation needed for this in 2020.
“The Icon Group in 2026, with a clean sheet, needs then to explain its deliberate choice of a site away from a general hospital. That also prompts the question of an overarching single cancer patient pathway and what it looks like for a private cancer centre which is not colocated. That facility lacks by definition a hospital-led single cancer journey maximising the possibility of seamless, muti-disciplinary teamwork with oversight at every stage.
“A patient’s peace of mind is seen as served by this coherence given to the whole cancer journey. In London the Icon Group, because co-located, has presumably belonged to such a hospital team. That should surely also be the case in Wales. A further key question follows. How far will the new centre participate in stages of the whole cancer journey beyond its own discrete treatment, for instance in follow-up etc?
“Assurance is also needed about emergency treatments. What mitigation and resuscitation procedures are in mind for when some things (inevitably) go wrong? Who handles any ‘corrective’ measures if neither the Icon Group itself nor the NHS is particularly experienced at it? In addition, what proportion of the facility’s specialist clinicians are also NHS employed and how are conflicts of interest avoided here?
“There seem to be many angles remaining opaque regarding this choice of a standalone facility, despite a media launch. If this perception is false, and consultation is indeed well underway, fair enough. But many stakeholders will still want to learn much more about this process or, better, be participating in it.”
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People have the right to pay for private medicine, which will always be more advanced than its public sector counterpart. If a loved one was seriously ill and you had the money to get the best treatment in the world then you would.
I broadly agree but why shouldn’t we have a world class public health system from which everyone can benefit?
If we all paid more taxes we could have one.
I don’t know why people have voted this down so much, just shows how selfish people can be.
Because according to some selfish, greedy people, only patients who can jump the queue due to having money, should be allowed great health care.
Where will the doctors/nurses and other people needed to staff the centre? there’s no magic staff tree, they will come from the NHS, meaning people who can’t afford to go private will wait longer. A two tier system is unfair.
No. It’s a private business. People will be employed from the open market, at much higher wages too.
Yes, from where do you think?
Which frees up spaces for Welsh nurses etc who cannot find jobs…
Why are there so many job vacancies in the NHS then, Sarah?
If you can’t get a job in the NHS, I don’t know what to say…https://www.nhs.wales/nhs-jobs-in-wales/
People should have the right to good quality healthcare, regardless of their wealth. It’s absolutely not true that private medicine, which will always be more advanced than its public sector counterpart.
As I have said elsewhere, if anything goes wrong in a private hospital, they generally don’t have emergency facilities so patients are whisked back into the good old NHS, costing even more. Private facilities don’t like complicated medical histories.
Again, completely inaccurate.
You have no idea what you are talking about.
What is particularly good about things like this is that you bring all that expertise to Wales and you have a chance to position us as a global oncology / medical hub surrounded by offshoot businesses, start ups etc. Also the chance for the Welsh NHS to take note of the work taking place on its doorstep, learning etc which would benefit Welsh NHS cancer docs and patients too.
Privatisation by any other name. If you’re poor and have cancer, maybe you deserve to die. If you’re rich and have cancer, step right in friend.
I worry about the moral judgement of patient care depending on individual means rather than the collective benefit of everyone within a local area.
This is a private business setting up in Wales. It has nothing to do with the NHS and nothing to do with NHS Wales being privatised.
There really are some I’m alright Jack characters here for sure.
No, just people who can see the benefits of both systems, especially as private healthcare takes pressure off the NHS.
It does not take pressure off the NHS at all, this is a myth. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/08/private-healthcare-sector-nhs-staff
Where do the doctors/nurses and other people needed to staff the centre come from? There’s no magic staff tree, they will come from the NHS, meaning people who can’t afford to go private will wait longer, making it a two tier system.
In the immediate, micro-level it takes some small pressure off NHS waiting lists, however, on a macro level, it shares the same doctors, drains public staff resources, and creates a two-tier system. If you can’t see that, you’re not thinking critically enough.
A closed facility benefits no-one and this will be available for NHS use when the price is right plus it will be easier to attract more top specialists into the NHS if they can do a couple of days of private work nearby.
At a cost to the NHS. If anything goes wrong in a private hospital, they generally don’t have emergency facilities so patients are whisked back into the good old NHS, costing even more. Private facilities don’t like complicated medical histories.
This isn’t Turkey teeth gone wrong. This is folks who’d otherwise be having the same life-saving treatment on the NHS with the same chances of needing emergency care.
Again, unless there is a private A and E, what part of, if anything goes wrong in a private hospital, they generally don’t have emergency facilities so patients are whisked back into the good old NHS, costing even more. Private facilities don’t like complicated medical histories, are you struggling to understand?
I don’t think you understood my point. If someone is treated here and it goes wrong yes I agree they add burden to emergency care. But the alternative is they have similar treatment on the NHS with a similar outcome of needing the same emergency care. So there is no additional burden on emergency care.
If those doctors in the private sector were in the NHS, there would be no need would there?
You don’t fix the NHS by banishing private healthcare. Australia beckons.
It’s a distinct private business. The patients are private patients. It is not the NHS.
That is why people cannot get appointments in the NHS as doctors are doing private work.
If it’s possible for doctors to combine private and NHS work many will do this. If Wales doesn’t offer the opportunity to do this many will go somewhere that does. So this facility will make it easier to recruit specialist skills in the NHS, and increase the number of NHS appointments.
This is an extract from this link https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/08/private-healthcare-sector-nhs-staff. Please read it… …year after year, the hours get longer, the size and complexity of the workload gets greater, the pay doesn’t really improve, and you see your colleagues leave without being replaced. On top of that, you have to give up more of your life outside of work, while morale in your workplace sinks and mistakes creep in. This is life working in the NHS. And it doesn’t end there. Imagine you then see another job opportunity advertised. It has a controlled workload with sociable and predictable hours (because the NHS… Read more »
The Tories running down the NHS to force folks into the private sector isn’t the same thing as a private sector that exists to offer those with the means the choice without harming the NHS. There’s no real reason why both sectors can’t coexist in rude health. The problem is political ideology in Whitehall which is forced on Wales by the way funding is based on what England spends.
I think you have completely missed the point off all this, and entertainingly so.
Oh really, I don’t think so…https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/08/private-healthcare-sector-nhs-staff
Poor spelling certainly isn’t entertaining…along with a lack of critical thinking skills.
Patients who are rushed back to the NHS place an avoidable burden on frontline services, which must supply emergency blue-light transfers and critical care beds when private procedures encounter unexpected complications in the UK.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/health/private-hospital-patients-nhs-emergency-37065747
Perhaps all the comments lauding private medicine, should learn to think critically…https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/08/private-healthcare-sector-nhs-staff