The NHS in the North East and Yorkshire is delivering more tests and checks than ever, new data shows, as new Community Diagnostic Centres open and further centres earmarked.

New figures reveal almost 200,000 MRI, CT and other diagnostic tests have been delivered in the region over the past six months – 60% more than in the same period last year.

A Community Diagnostic Centre in Barnsley’s retail centre The Glass Works is already making headway on cutting waiting times by offering a range of services including breast screening, phlebotomy (blood test), X-Ray and DEXA (bone density services). Breast cancer is one of the most common types of cancer and this centre been vital to helping breast screening uptake rates in the town improve from 50% to 72% in the last six months alone.

Work on two new Community Diagnostic Centres for North and North East Lincolnshire is set to begin in the coming months, one in Scunthorpe town centre and one in Grimsby which together will offer almost 300,000 additional diagnostic appointments a year once open.

In addition to this, subject to planning permission, work will begin in Hull in the New Year on a Community Diagnostic Centre at Albion Square in the city centre (pictured), which will eventually have capacity to deliver almost 200,000 test and checks a year. The facility will be accessible for all patients, with bus services directly serving the location and the Paragon Interchange just a short walk away, meaning the Community Diagnostic Centre could accommodate patients from outside of Hull and the East Riding.

These Community Diagnostic Centres will join a roster of centres already providing diagnostic services in the region and will play a key role in carrying out record numbers of tests and checks, with patients able to get tested at convenient locations as close to peoples’ homes.

Dr Yvette Oade, Medical Director for NHS England in the North East and Yorkshire, said: “Community diagnostic centres have been key in helping us to see more people than ever before and these new testing centres will allow more of our patients to be seen in locations that are most convenient for them.”

Overall, there were a total of 190,000 tests and checks carried out in the last six months, across the North East and Yorkshire – up 60% in the same period in 2022.

This announcement also comes as a new endoscopy unit at the Montagu Community Diagnostic Centre in Doncaster will open its doors to its first patients later this month.

Alongside this offer, hundreds of thousands of NHS patients who have been waiting the longest for treatment will be offered the opportunity to travel to a different hospital, if it means they could be seen sooner.

As part of the ambitious NHS elective recovery plan, the NHS has recently announced that any patient who has been waiting longer than 40 weeks and does not have an appointment within the next eight weeks will be contacted by their hospital via letter, text, or email.