Screening
Cancer screening
Brisbane South PHN recommends all practices regularly check and participate in training about current screening guidelines for breast cancer, cervical cancer, bowel cancer and lung cancer.
Screening guidelines:
- BreastScreen Queensland is part of the national BreastScreen Australia program, providing free breast screening to all Queensland woman aged 40 and over. The program is available to women at over 230 locations throughout the state.
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The National Cervical Screening Program reduces illness and death from cervical cancer. Women and people with a cervix aged 25 to 74 are invited to have a Cervical Screening Test every 5 years through their healthcare provider.
- National Bowel Cancer Screening Program aims to reduce deaths from bowel cancer by detecting early signs of the disease. If found early, more than 90% of cases can be successfully treated. Eligible Australians aged 45 to 74 can do a free test at home every 2 years. Learn about the program and how to do the test.
- Clinical Guidelines – National Bowel Cancer Screening Program
- NBSCP and Australia Primary Health Care Nurses Association (APNA) Bowel cancer education
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The National Lung Cancer Screening Program (NLCSP) is a screening program using low-dose computed tomography (low-dose CT) scans to look for lung cancer in high-risk people without any symptoms. It aims to find lung cancer early and save lives. Screening for eligible people is available now.
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Quality improvement toolkit for general practice – cancer prevention
Encouraging patient participation
There are many ways for practices to encourage patients to participate in screening, including:
displaying brochures posters and translated resources in the practice
provide translated resources tailored to the linguistic and cultural demographics of your patient population
demonstrating test kit use
sending reminders to eligible patients.
Resources are available from:
Bowel screening: Bowel cancer screening resources | Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing
Cervical Screening: Cervical screening resources | Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing and Resource Hub - ACPCC
Lung Screening: Lung cancer screening resources | Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing
Breast Screening: Breast cancer screening resources | Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing
Encouraging patient participation can sometimes be difficult – information to support you with this is available from RACGP
Connect to the National Cancer Screening Register (NCSR)
Best Practice and MedicalDirector users can now access their patient’s bowel, cervical and lung screening information from within their patient records, to help maximise participation in these life-saving programs.
Refer to integration instructions:
The National Cancer Screening Register (NCSR) integration is designed to streamline workflows for healthcare organisations, allowing you to access and report patient clinical information for the bowel, cervical and lung cancer screening programs directly from the software you use every day.
More information is available from the general integration guide. or healthcare providers information.
Using the National Cancer Screening Register: have you linked to PRODA?
Have you linked your accounts? If not, book in some time to be supported with this process.
Participant portal
People participating in bowel, cervical or lung screening can update their personal details, manage participation, update communication preferences and view screening information. Instructions on how to access Participant Portal.
Cervical screening self-collection
Cervical screening rates amongst eligible population, aged 25-74 years in the Brisbane south region is 37.1% (1.1% less than the National average of 38.2%).
Health professionals play a central and critical role in the National Cervical Screening Program in assessing patient risk and using clinical judgement to recommend testing and follow-up.
Cervical screening self-collection resources
Cervical screening target poster
NCSR target poster
Support from our Quality Improvement Coordinators
Our Quality Improvement Coordinators can support your practice with quality improvement activities focused on improving cancer screening rates. More information is available on our Quality Improvement page.