PATIENTS have placed Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in the top 20 per cent for cancer care in England.

Results from the recent National Cancer Patient Experience Survey placed the trust highly for providing excellent overall care for cancer patients.

Over 90 per cent of the cancer patients surveyed rated the overall care they received as excellent or very good.

Overall, 621 patients from Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust were asked by Quality Health, an organisation that specialises in measuring patients’ experiences of hospital services, to rate the care they received, from diagnosis to treatment and recovery.

All patients had been seen at one of the Foundation Trust’s hospitals – in Basingstoke, Andover or Winchester – between September and November 2012, with surveys being completed between January and June this year.

The Foundation Trust was also placed in the top 20 per cent of trusts in England for giving complete explanations of the purpose of diagnostic tests, and for clinical nurse specialists giving understandable answers to important questions all or most of the time.

Hampshire Hospitals Trust chief executive Mary Edwards said: “Our staff are committed to providing excellent care to ensure every patient’s journey through this worrying time is as comfortable as possible.

“There are still improvements that can be made and we continuously strive to improve our services.

“For example, we are planning to create a new cancer treatment centre in the north of Hampshire, which will provide a number of high-quality cancer services closer to patients’ homes, as well as information, advice and support for patients and their families.”

For more information on plans for the £13.5million cancer treatment centre, and current cancer services at Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, please visit the website at hampshirehospitals.nhs. uk.