Cyted pilot helps to cut endoscopies in the NHS, results reveal

The use of Cyted’s non-endoscopic test for precursors to oesophageal cancer has helped reduce endoscopy waiting lists by 75 per cent and is targeted to save the NHS £3.86million over five years.

The Station Road-based diagnostics company last week announced the results of an independent report by Unity Insights on the impact of their innovative diagnostic test in the NHS.

At the start of the scheme, the NHS North West region had the longest waitlist for endoscopy in England, with more than 50 per cent of patients waiting over six weeks for a potentially life-saving diagnostic test.

Unity evaluated a pilot project, titled CYTOPRIME, run by Cyted and the NHS. CYTOPRIME offered surveillance for NHS patients with Barrett’s oesophagus, a precursor to cancer, in the north west of England in 2022. For five months, Cyted’s capsule sponge test, a minimally invasive alternative to endoscopies, was used to monitor patients in the community.

The test was able to identify low-risk Barrett’s oesophagus surveillance patients who could safely wait for a routine endoscopy, while allowing a subgroup of high-risk patients to be fast-tracked for urgent endoscopies.

A total of 150 patients received the capsule sponge test, cutting the number of required endoscopies by 107 and delivering a 31 per cent fall in patients waiting more than six weeks from referral to procedure.

The Unity Insights study found Cyted’s test cleared endoscopy backlogs for four hospitals, reduced burdens on endoscopy services and would deliver a positive return on investment for the NHS. By the end of the project, the backlog had been cleared in all four NHS trusts.

The implementation and outcomes of the project were modelled over 12 months, and showed the project delivered a significant cost saving. The report calculated that a single local NHS Integrated Care System could save as much as £3.86m over five years by adopting the technology.

“The findings of this report clearly demonstrate the huge positive impact of our technology,” says Cyted CEO and co-founder Marcel Gehrung.

“They show that we can cut waiting times, deliver earlier diagnoses, and help to relieve pressure on health systems still recovering from the pandemic.

“By making this technology widely available in communities, we can diagnose cancer earlier, improving patient outcomes.”