Ken Wyatt (Hasluck, Liberal Party, Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Hansard source

I acknowledge the member for Macarthur for bringing such an important topic into the House. This is a key area that requires a better understanding across the population. We often talk about prostate cancer. A challenge for men is to look at some of the symptoms and to seek early treatment for those symptoms as opposed to leaving it until the cancer has progressed to a point which makes the recovery process much more challenging. Whilst technology and testing have substantially improved, the issues of awareness and the need to make a decision early and seek advice remain.

I have met with many organisations and men's groups where men are seeking support and intervention at a time in their life in which they have experienced prostate cancer but have let it get to a point where some of their treatment has been most challenging. They are left with the effects of tissue removal, which sometimes damages nerve endings within the region, impacting on their quality of life in many senses. But the work that Minister Hunt did in freeing up additional funding for prostate cancer nurses has made an incredible difference to both the informative element of the treatment process and the explanation to men about what they're going to go through with the treatment—and, equally, how they need to give some thought to planning their lives in the context of subsequent treatment.

Often one of the challenges we have is that, as men, we have the mindset that we are immortal on many fronts and that a slight pain is something we can ignore for a period of time—that is, until a prognosis is undertaken and suddenly you're faced with the challenge of having to have medical intervention. The treatment afterwards is often also debilitating to quality of life and has an impact on both the social and the emotional wellbeing of individuals. When, over the years, I've talked to men of their experiences, they've often talked about the lack of parallel supports that are often necessary when you have medical interventions of this nature. And it's absolutely critical that, in developing awareness through this motion, my colleagues take the step of making sure that they have tests at intervals within their lives so at least they have some certainty that the onset of prostate cancer isn't something that's going to impact or influence their quality of life.

Robotics has made a difference—there's much more accuracy—but so too has having access to large centres in which treatment occurs. One of the gaps that we often see when we read any data on health is that in rural, regional and remote areas of Australia diagnosis is sometimes delayed because of limited access to the right medical GP practices or primary healthcare providers and the subsequent testing. But one thing that we have done exceptionally well under various governments is to put a focus on prostate cancer in a way that we've not done in the past, and the points that you, Member for Macarthur, made around medical intervention are important.

The flip side to this is that the social and emotional wellbeing supports need to be there, because, unless you have supports, particularly if your levels of literacy are problematic and you don't clearly understand complex medical elements, then the fear aspect of cancer, particularly prostate, may mean that you don't totally grasp what is required and what the potential side effects might be in terms of quality of life. But we're getting better. Hospitals are providing levels of support on a much better basis. Models of care now mean that we see parallel supports in place to ensure that we give an individual the best possible journey through life and often recovery.

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