National Audit of Primary Breast Cancer

Welcome to the National Audit of Primary Breast Cancer (NAoPri).

More than 55,000 people are diagnosed with a new primary breast cancer every year in the UK.

The NAoPri will report on all patients newly diagnosed with primary breast cancer (stages 0 to 3) in NHS hospitals in England and Wales. Building on work previously conducted by the National Audit of Breast Cancer in Older Patients (NABCOP), the NAoPri will report on patients with primary breast cancer of all ages, both female and male, for the first time.

With data on patients diagnosed with cancer in an NHS setting routinely collected as part of their care and treatment, the audit will use these valuable data resources and bring the information all together to provide a comprehensive analysis of all aspects of primary breast cancer care in England and Wales, whilst protecting patient anonymity. This will allow the audit to look at what is being done well, where it’s being done well, and what needs to be done much better.

Kieran Horgan, clinical co-lead, says the NAoPri is a very exciting initiative and will work closely with the National Audit of Metastatic Breast Cancer (NAoMe). You can hear more thoughts from Kieran in the video below.

Kieran Horgan, Clinical Lead (Surgery), National Audit of Primary Breast Cancer

Planning for the audit is well under way and a broad survey of people involved in primary breast cancer care has been carried out, including clinicians, nurses, charities and individual patients.

The audit will examine the generality of breast cancer care and also focus on a number of important challenges. These include the care of younger patients, the diagnosis and treatment of patients with more aggressive triple negative cancers, and the needs of smaller groups of patients, including men.

The clinical leads on NAoPri are:

• Professor Kieran Horgan, Clinical Lead (Surgery)
• Professor David Dodwell, Clinical Lead (Clinical Oncology)
• Dr Mark Verrill, Clinical Lead (Medical Oncology)

The first audit reports will be published in 2024, and we intend to keep everyone informed as fully as possible. This page will be updated whenever more information becomes available.

See the NATCAN FAQs for any questions relating to how the audit will run and the data it will use.

Want to find out more? Reach out to us via email.

Email: [email protected]

Twitter: @NAoPri_news