Cancer Mortality Data

You asked

Please find below a set of questions relating to VTE in cancer patients.

Question 1a: In England and Wales, in 2015, how many people had cancer listed as a cause of death on their death certificate?

Question 1b: Of the above number, how many had one of the below cancers listed as a cause of death on their death certificate?

• Lung cancer

• Brain cancer

• Bladder cancer

Question 2a: In England and Wales, in 2015, how many people had cancer and venous thromboembolism* listed as a cause of death on their death certificate?

Question 2b: Of the above number, how many had one of the below cancers and venous thromboembolism* listed as a cause of death on their death certificate?

• Lung cancer

• Brain cancer

• Bladder cancer

*Venous thromboembolism is defined by the following ICD 10 codes: I80.0-I80.3, I80.8-I80.9, I82.9, O22.2 – O22.3, O87.0 – O87.1, I26.0, and I26.9.

We said

Thank you for your query VTE in cancer patients.

Figures for deaths occurring in England and Wales in 2015 broken down by underlying cause of death, age and sex are available in our latest release 'Death registered in England and Wales: 2015' which is available on our website at the following link:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/deathsregistrationsummarytables/2015

The dataset accompanying this release is available here:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/deathregistrationssummarytablesenglandandwalesreferencetables

The above dataset shows that in England and Wales in 2015:

1a) There were 144,330 deaths with an underlying cause of cancer (defined as International Classification of Diseases codes C00 - C97).

1b) (i) There were 30,520 deaths with an underlying cause of lung cancer (defined as International Classification of Diseases codes C33 - C34)

(ii) There were 3,684 deaths with an underlying cause of brain cancer (defined as International Classification of Diseases code C71)

(iii) There were 4,748 deaths with an underlying cause of bladder cancer (defined as International Classification of Diseases code C67 )

Questions 2a) and 2b) regarding how many over the above cases also listed VTE on the death certificate cannot be answered from published information and will require a bespoke extract of data.

Special extracts and tabulations of mortality data for England and Wales are available to order (subject to legal frameworks, disclosure control, resources and agreements of costs, where appropriate). Such enquiries should be made to: mortality@ons.gov.uk. We recommend that you contact the Mortality Analysis team directly in order to discuss your data requirements in more detail.

As this information is already available to you via this route ONS considers that s.21(1) applies to this request and the information does not have to be supplied under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act. s.21(1) is an absolute exemption and no consideration of the public interest test needs to be applied.