A Million GP Visits Each Year Call For Government Action On Skin Cancer, Australia

Main Category: Dermatology
Also Included In: Primary Care / General Practice
Article Date: 15 Oct 2008 - 3:00 PDT

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New research suggesting skin cancer may soon require one million GP consultations in Australia each year showed why the Federal Government must commit to a long-term SunSmart campaign or face unsustainable medical costs, Cancer Council Australia said today.

Commenting on a new government report* on non-melanoma skin cancer encounters in hospitals and general practice, Cancer Council Australia CEO Professor Ian Olver said if current trends continued Australia would struggle to pay its skin cancer treatment bill.

"New data from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare and Cancer Australia show that GP consultations to treat non-melanoma skin cancer increased by 14 per cent between 1998-2000 and 2005-2007 - from around 836,500 to 950,000 visits each year," Professor Olver said.

"If this trend continues, we will soon see more than a million GP consultations each year for non-melanoma skin cancer. This is a huge health system cost burden for a cancer that is almost entirely preventable through appropriate sun protection."

Professor Olver said while the report states that the full extent of non-melanoma skin cancer prevalence remains unclear, what is clear is that the associated cost burden is enormous - and that SunSmart education campaigns can influence behaviour change to reduce it.

"Skin cancer prevention campaigns work, yet they have only been run at the national level since the summer of 2006-07," he said. "And there is no commitment to a campaign beyond the summer that is rapidly approaching.

"The Rudd Government has committed to a new, invigorated approach to disease prevention. As part of this approach, an ongoing investment in a national SunSmart campaign should be built into the next federal budget."

Professor Olver said the damaging effects of ultraviolet radiation in most cases appeared in later life, so the ageing of Australia's population over the next four decades meant non-melanoma skin cancer costs would escalate if investment in prevention did not occur now.

*Non-melanoma skin cancer: general practice consultations, hospitalisation and mortality - AIHW, Cancer Australia

Source:
Glen Turner
Cancer Council Australia