The Economist Intelligence Unit has created the Latin America Cancer Control Scorecard (LACCS) to assess cancer-control policies and programmes in 12 Latin American countries. The LACCS shows that a number of countries in the region have put in place or strengthened their National Cancer Control Plans. However, plans are often not sufficiently comprehensive and lack funding. Progress has also been made in rolling out population-based cancer registries in the region, but issues with data quality and coverage persist. Other areas with room for improvement include high rates of late-stage diagnosis, insufficient resources for current and future cancer-care needs, fragmented healthcare systems and inequalities in access to care.

Prostate cancer is placing an ever-growing burden on already strained Latin American healthcare systems, as both the incidence of the disease and mortality rates rise. For the purposes of this report, Latin America encompasses the territory from the northern border of Mexico to the southern tip of South America, including the Caribbean.

Prostate cancer is the leading cause of male cancer-related deaths in the region, and the disease and economic burden is set to rise in tandem with longevity and changes in lifestyle and diet.

Addressing this rapid growth is thus an urgent task, and one that higher-income countries around the world have addressed with some success through patient-centred healthcare. In the US, for example, integrated-care systems have been delivered though accountable care organisations that focus on patient needs.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) says that "integrated people-centred health services means putting the needs of people and communities, not diseases, at the centre of health systems, and empowering people to take charge of their own health".[i] However, integrated and patient-centred healthcare has seen a slow rate of adoption in the Latin America region. This suggests that much work needs to be done to sharpen the focus on respecting and responding to patient needs.

This report draws on findings from an Economist Intelligence Unit study, Assessing the burden of Prostate Cancer in Brazil,[ii] and in-depth interviews with ten experts on cancer care in the region. It assesses current prostate-cancer developments and provides real-world examples from Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica and Mexico of how institutions are addressing, or failing to address, prostate cancer through a patient-centred approach.

Learn more by downloading our 'Assessing the burden of Prostate Cancer in Brazil' report below.  

[i] WHO, WHO Framework on integrated people-centred health services. Available at: http://www.who.int/servicedeliverysafety/areas/people-centred-care/en/

[ii] The Economist Intelligence Unit, Assessing the burden of Prostate Cancer in Brazil, October 2016.

The regional rise in age-standardised incidence has been running at four to eight times the global average since the 1990s. Meanwhile, the disease is no longer a concern large of developed countries but has become an increasingly important one in many emerging market states, where it is frequently now the most common form of cancer among females.

This report, Breast Cancer: The challenge and response, written by The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) and commissioned by Pfizer, examines the growing health burden of the disease in 10 major Asia-Pacific countries and territories, as well as how health systems are addressing the challenge.