CAMPAIGNERS have called for an overhaul in cancer treatment as it emerged that only one in ten Scots diagnosed with pancreatic, liver, brain, lung, oesophageal or stomach tumours will live beyond five years.

They blamed a lack of research funding and "negativity" among the scientific community for the poor survival rates which have barely changed in the past three decades, despite significant leaps in more high-profile cancers such as breast and prostate which nearly nine in ten patients can now expect to beat for at least five years. Combined, these six diseases received just 17 per cent of UK research funding for common cancers during the past 12 years.

Poor awareness, lack of treatment and late diagnoses, particularly in cases of liver cancer which are often only picked up when patients are admitted to hospital as an emergency, were also said to be at play. In total, around 9,500 people in Scotland are diagnosed with one of these six cancers each year and combined they account for more than half of cancer deaths.

Kevin Armstrong, head of policy at Pancreatic Cancer UK, said: “We suspect this is due to the scale of the challenge, less interest in the scientific community, and a sense of negativity as to whether research would be successful in the less survivable cancers compared to the more survivable.

"Cancers like breast and prostate have seen improvements in survival partly because the right amount of research funding has been invested into those diseases. Diagnosis and treatments have improved, awareness about symptoms and general awareness of the disease has increased, and a vast amount of campaigning has been carried out for those cancers."

The gulf in survival rates will be highlighted today at the Scottish Parliament as a newly-formed taskforce, made up of representatives of six cancer charities, presents evidence to MSPs.

The Less Survivable Cancers Taskforce is seeking Government-backed targets to improve survival rates, increased research investment, faster diagnoses, public information campaigns to boost awareness, and better access to treatments and clinical trials.

Overall, Scots diagnosed with one of these six cancers are 55 per cent less likely on average to survive beyond five years, compared to a patient diagnosed with one of 14 other types. Survival rates in Scotland are also slightly poorer than the UK average, at 12 per cent compared 14 per cent UK-wide.

The latest figures for Scotland show that only 3.8 per cent of patients who were diagnosed with pancreatic cancer between 2007 and 2011 were still alive five years later, almost unchanged from 2.8 per cent for patients diagnosed with the disease between 1987 and 1991. Five-year survival for lung cancer has also stagnated, going from 6.4 per cent 30 years ago to just 9.8 per cent now, while the long-term survival from brain tumours and cancers of the nervous system has been fixed around 15 per cent for 30 years.

Patients diagnosed with stomach and oesophageal cancers also face a bleak outlook, with just 17.2 and 12.3 per cent respectively still alive after five years, while one of the fastest growing cancers, liver, claims three quarters of sufferers within five years.

Clare Adamson, an MSP for Motherwell and Wishaw who is backing the taskforce, said the current situation was "absolutely disgraceful". She added: "In the last 40 years, the five-year survival rate has almost doubled for breast cancer and tripled for prostate cancer. Yet in the same period, there has been precious little progress for people with these six less survivable cancers.

“Now is the time to take action to transform the future for patients with these cancers and their families.”

It comes as newly-released figures from ISD Scotland, show that the number of patients waiting too long for key diagnostic tests, including those used to detect cancer, hit a record high at the beginning of 2017. The number of patients waiting more than six weeks for an endoscopy has more than doubled between June 2016 and January this year, to 5,863, while delays in radiology continued - going from 329 patients waiting more than six weeks in November 2015 to a peak of 5,092 in January, before falling back to 4,565 in March.

Gregor McNie, Cancer Research UK’s senior public affairs manager for Scotland, said: “Patients must be diagnosed and treated swiftly if they are to have the best chance of survival and so we need to see fast progress to ensure no one is left waiting too long."

The Scottish Government said it would invest an extra £50 million to improve waiting times performance.