HEALTH officials have raised concerns about the lack of ethnic minorities being screened for bowel cancer.

The issue was brought up at Bolton Clinical Commissioning Group's board meeting.

Stephen Liversedge, clinical director of primary care and health improvement, revealed that less than 50 per cent of people from ethnic minorities were being screened.

This is despite what he described as a positive overall picture, with 58.1 per cent of people aged from 60 to 74 getting checked out — a rise of more than 10 per cent since 2011.

But Dr Liversedge said: "We are above the Greater Manchester average but the question for you all to discuss now is what can we do to improve this?

"What pulls us down I have to say is the rate of uptake among ethnic minorities. It is substantially different than uptake among the white population in Bolton. Their screening rates are less than 50 per cent.

"That makes a difference to our overall figures. What can we do in Bolton to improve? I don't like us being in champions league positions. I would like us to be champions."

According to the CCG figures, Bolton is the fourth best commissioning group in Greater Manchester in terms of the percentage of people getting bowel cancer screening.

Members of the board discussed how GPs followed up with patients to ensure they were screened, with some claiming that letters sent out to homes were not enough to encourage them.

Romesh Gupta, secondary care specialist member, said: "I think the main problem is awareness and bowel cancer in particular. It's not easy to do with any sector and particularly for the ethnic minorities.

"The modern issue that exists in Bolton is diabetes. We have diabetes champions who are trained. I think that we need a similar champion not only for one cancer but multiple cancers.

"Why can't we provide training to help this?"

The board decided to take the issue back the the Executive in order to draw up a possible action plan to put before next month's meeting.