A recent study has provided an optimistic outlook for people in the UK who are diagnosed with cancer. Thanks to advances in diagnostic and treatment procedures, it has now been shown that 50 percent of those diagnosed with cancer will eventually be “cured” of the disease.

The study was conducted using data from seven million patients in the UK with a total of 17 different types of cancers. Analysis of data revealed that the survival rate has doubled over the last four decades. In the 1970s, only one in four patients with cancer could expect to survive for a decade after diagnosis. Back then, 50 percent of those fighting cancer could only be expected to live for a year.

This rate has increased drastically in the last 10 years. Data indicated that in 2005-2006 half of cancer patients could expect to live for five years. However, for 2010-2011, that rate had reached a post-diagnosis life expectancy of a decade. Once this 10-year milestone had been reached, patients showed no more risk of cancer-related death than anyone who had not received a diagnosis.

It is this drop in probably of death that encourages the use of the word “cured” by some in regards to cancer.

Survival rates for several common cancers has improved even more dramatically. The 10-year survival rate for testicular cancers has gone up to 98 percent, prostate cancer is at 80 percent, while skin cancer is at 89 percent and breast cancer is boasting a 78 percent chance of decade long survival.

While Britain is still behind other European countries in their survival rates, British experts are very encouraged by their findings. They hope to increase long-term survival by another 25 percent in the next two decades. Their findings indicate that a day may be fast approaching when a diagnosis of cancer does not read like a death sentence to patients.