These cancer survival estimates are an interactive presentation of the National Statistics publication "Cancer Survival in England: adult, stage at diagnosis, childhood and geographical patterns for patients diagnosed followed up to 2019".

The full release, with data tables and statistical commentary, is published here. National Statistics are a subset of official statistics, which have been certified by the UK Statistics Authority as compliant with its Code of Practice for Statistics.

For queries relating to this bulletin or to provide feedback, please contact us via email at ncrasenquiries@phe.gov.uk.

These pages provide 1-year age-standardised net survival estimates for 31 common cancers. The estimates are for adults (aged 15 to 99 years) diagnosed between 2014 and 2018 in England. Estimates are presented for men and females, and persons. Patients were followed up for at least one whole calendar year (up to 31 December 2019).

The 31 cancer sites represent 95% of new diagnoses (excluding non-melanoma skin cancer) in England in 2018.

Cancer sites are included if 1-year age-standardised survival estimates are available for at least 75% of Cancer Alliances for either men or females; estimates for persons are presented if estimates are presented for both men and females.

Estimates are presented for England and for three subnational geographical levels of organisation of the NHS in England:

  • seven NHS regions
  • 21 Cancer Alliances (average population of 2.9 million)
  • 42 Sustainability and Transformation Partnerships (average population of 1.3 million)

1-year and 5-year survival for males or females for each cancer site


Hover over the points to see details on survival estimates.

Notes

  1. Survival estimates were age-standardised using a standard set of age-specific weights.
  2. Survival estimates presented are for all persons except for:
    1. Sex-specific cancers (cervix, ovary, uterus and vulva for females and prostate and testis for males)
    2. Larynx cancers are presented only for males.
  3. 5-year estimates are not presented for mesothelioma and stomach cancer for females
  4. 5-year estimates are not presented for testicular cancer for males.
  5. The International Classification of Diseases 10th Revision (ICD-10) was used to classify cancer sites.

Survival estimates for 1-year or 5-year split by stage


All cancers are staged 1-4 except Myeloma which is 1-3. If a stage does not appear this means that age-standardised results could not be calculated.

The width of the bar represents the percent of stage at diagnoses.

Hover over points to see details on survival estimates and stage distribution.

Notes

  1. Survival estimates were age-standardised using a standard set of age-specific weights.
  2. Survival estimates presented are for males and females except for:
    1. Sex-specific cancers (cervix, ovary, uterus and vulva for females and prostate for males)
    2. Larynx cancers are presented only for males because estimates were not obtained for 75% of Cancer Alliances for females.
    3. Breast cancers are presented only for females because estimates were not obtained for 75% of Cancer Alliances for males.
  3. The dotted line represents survival for all stages combined including unstageable and missing.
  4. The International Classification of Diseases 10th Revision (ICD-10) was used to classify cancer sites

Smoothed trends in 1-, 5- and 10-year survival for children (aged 0 to 14 years) diagnosed with cancer in England between 2002 and 2019


Hover over the points to see details on survival estimates.

Notes

  1. Survival estimates were age-standardised using a standard set of age-specific weights.
  2. The International Classification of Diseases 10th Revision (ICD-10) was used to classify cancer sites.


Ranges in 1-year survival showing minimum and maximum by geography type, and England


Hover over the points to see details on area name and survival estimates.

Notes

  1. Survival estimates were age-standardised using a standard set of age-specific weights.
  2. Survival estimates presented are for all persons except for:
    1. Sex-specific cancers (cervix, ovary, uterus and vulva for females and prostate for males)
    2. Larynx and liver cancers are presented only for males because estimates were not obtained for 75% of Alliances for females.
    3. Anus and breast cancers are presented only for females because estimates were not obtained for 75% of Alliances for males.
  3. Survival estimates were only presented for each geography if there were more than 75% of the areas with results for 1-year. Age-standardised results are always presented for England
  4. The International Classification of Diseases 10th Revision (ICD-10) was used to classify cancer sites.

1-year survival estimates split by sex and geography type


Hover over points to see details on area name and survival estimates. Select an area to highlight their survival estimates.

Notes

  1. Survival estimates were age-standardised using a standard set of age-specific weights.
  2. Survival estimates presented are for males and females except for:
    1. Sex-specific cancers (cervix, ovary, uterus and vulva for females and prostate for males)
    2. Larynx and liver cancers are presented only for males because estimates were not obtained for 75% of Cancer Alliances for females.
    3. Anus and breast cancers are presented only for females because estimates were not obtained for 75% of Cancer Alliances for males.
  3. The International Classification of Diseases 10th Revision (ICD-10) was used to classify cancer sites

Map of 1-year survival estimates in England


Click on the drop-down menus to select a sex, type of geography and tumour site. Then click "Load Map" to view the data. The map may take a few moments to load.

Hover over the map to see the survival for particular areas. To highlight an area of interest use the "Select an area" drop-down list.

Click the button to load map.

Notes

  1. Survival estimates were age-standardised using a standard set of age-specific weights.
  2. Survival estimates presented are for all persons except for:
    1. Sex-specific cancers (cervix, ovary, uterus and vulva for females and prostate for males)
    2. Larynx and liver cancers are presented only for men because estimates were not obtained for 75% of Alliances for females.
    3. Anus and breast cancers are presented only for females because estimates were not obtained for 75% of Alliances for men.
  3. Survival estimates were only presented for each geography if there were more than 75% of the areas with results for 1-year. Age-standardised results are always presented for England
  4. The International Classification of Diseases 10th Revision (ICD-10) was used to classify cancer sites.



The complete set of survival results that was used to produce the National Statistics release "Cancer Survival in England: adult, stage at diagnosis, childhood and geographical patterns" is available to download from the gov.uk website.

These reference tables are provided in OpenDocument Spreadsheet file format and are readable by standard business software, including free opensource packages.



How to interpret these statistics

These subnational cancer survival estimates are based on net survival, which is calculated by comparing the survival of cancer patients with that of the general population. Estimates are age-standardised to adjust for changes in the age profile of cancer patients over time and differences between geographical areas.

Prostate cancer.

The introduction of the Prostate-Specific Antigen (PSA) test during the 1990s increased the diagnosis of asymptomatic prostate cancers. Male diagnosed with prostate cancer in this way have higher survival than other men diagnosed with prostate cancer. There is continuing geographic variation in the usage of these tests, which will contribute to the geographical variation of survival estimated in prostate cancer.

Age-specific survival estimates are available for every combination of cancer site, geographical area and sex when they pass robustness tests. Age-standardised estimates are provided when all the age-specific estimates pass those tests.

Quality and methodogy

More information on methodology can be found in the Quality and Methodology Information report, which also contains important information on:

  • the strengths and limitations of the data and how it compares with related data
  • uses and users of the data
  • how the output was created
  • the quality of the output including the accuracy of the data

Links to other related statistics

In common with all the other cancer survival bulletins, this publication is based on the data summarised in the Cancer registration statistics, England statistical bulletin.

Estimates for England are the same as those presented in Cancer survival in England; combining diagnoses from across England allows for survival estimates to be presented for 31 cancer sites in total.

Users interested in survival estimates by cancer site, stage of diagnoses and subnational geographies should use this publication.

Estimates for CAs and STPs are also presented in the Index of cancer survival for Clinical Commissioning Groups in England for breast, colorectal and lung cancers and an index of all cancers combined.

The Index bulletin uses a different methodology to this publication. This means results presented here are not directly comparable with those from the Index. The main use for the Index of cancer survival in other geographies is the calculation of an all-cancer estimate of survival for small health geographies.

More information on the contents and uses of these publications can be found in the article Cancer statistics explained: different data sources and when they should be used. Statistics on cancer around the UK are produced in: