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A general practitioner in County Antrim has expressed significant worry regarding the delays women are experiencing in obtaining breast cancer treatment in Northern Ireland. At the Notting Hill Medical Practice within the Northern Trust, 32 women were identified as red-flag cases over a five-month span this year. Among them, three patients endured late diagnoses after waiting more than eight weeks to be seen by a consultant, with an additional nine women still awaiting consultation, one of whom has been on the waiting list for over ten weeks. Dr. Jilly O’Hagan described this prolonged period of uncertainty as “traumatic.”
One patient recounted months of being in a state of limbo and expressed a strong desire to have her cancer treated swiftly. After learning that more than 80,000 women were ahead of her on the waiting list, she chose to pay for a private diagnosis, which confirmed she had stage two breast cancer. The woman shared her frustration over the delay, describing its detrimental impact on her mental and physical well-being. Dr. O’Hagan highlighted that such service shortcomings are not observed in England, Scotland, or Wales, questioning why women in Northern Ireland are subjected to what she called a “substandard service.” She noted, “The new regional breast cancer service is not functioning – there is a bottleneck, they are not meeting the targets for women who are red-flagged… It never used to be like this, it’s not working.”
Red-flag referrals mark cases where a GP determines a patient should receive urgent attention for suspected cancer based on specific clinical symptoms as outlined by the Northern Ireland Cancer Network (NICaN). Ideally, patients flagged in this way should be seen by a specialist within two weeks, with treatment beginning within 62 days following diagnosis. However, between April and June 2025, roughly 67% of patients—about 840 individuals—waited beyond 62 days to start cancer treatment after an urgent referral. These delays are particularly concerning given the aggressive nature of many cancers and the importance of timely intervention.
A woman from the Southern Trust region, diagnosed with stage four breast cancer, detailed how delays and miscommunication between health trusts prolonged her diagnosis. After first noticing symptoms in June and being red-flagged in early July, she experienced confusion as her case was passed between Craigavon Area Hospital and the Ulster Hospital in different health trusts. Nearly ten weeks following her initial GP appointment, she received her stage four diagnosis and began chemotherapy in late October. She described her care as “inadequate, not joined up and impersonal,” and shared how the experience has left her and her family emotionally devastated. Her distress motivated her to write directly to the health minister about her case
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