A CT scan for people aged 55 to 74 who have ever smoked. Finds most cancers at stage 1 or 2, against roughly a third normally.
NHS screening is free — this page explains it, we do not sell it
Honest about who benefits and who may be harmed
A GP to talk through a result, a recall or a missed invitation
Your NHS records in the room, with your consent
Talk it through with a GP
Screening itself is free on the NHS. If you want a result explained, have been recalled, or missed an invitation and are not sure what to do, a 20-minute appointment with a GMC-registered GP is £40. Same-day appointments are usually available, 6am to 10pm, seven days a week.
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People aged 55 to 74 who are recorded as ever having smoked — current smokers and people who gave up decades ago. Invitations are generated from GP records.
It is a two-stage programme. Being invited to the first stage does not mean you will be scanned.
If your risk comes out low, you are not scanned — which is a considered decision rather than a refusal, because scanning low-risk people finds more harmless abnormalities than cancers.
This is an England programme, rolling out area by area towards national coverage. If your area has not started yet, you will not have been invited — that is geography rather than eligibility.
Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are at earlier stages, evaluating or piloting rather than running national programmes. Worth checking locally rather than assuming.
You are not eligible, and it is worth being straightforward about why that is uncomfortable.
Lung cancer in people who have never smoked is real and appears to be rising, particularly in women. The programme targets ever-smokers because that is where the evidence of benefit lies and where the yield is high enough to justify scanning.
If you have never smoked, symptoms are your route — and a persistent cough, coughing blood, breathlessness or weight loss should be taken every bit as seriously in you as in a smoker. They frequently are not, and that is a recognised cause of late diagnosis.
Usually a phone call lasting fifteen to twenty minutes, or an appointment at a mobile unit, often in a supermarket or retail car park.
A low-dose CT scan, taking around ten minutes, usually in a mobile scanner at the same site.
A letter within about four weeks.
Lung cancer kills more people in the UK than any other cancer. More than breast, prostate and bowel cancer combined.
The reason is timing. Historically only around one in three lung cancers was found at stage 1 or 2, when it can still be treated with the intention of curing it. The rest were found once they had already spread.
In the English programme, the great majority of screen-detected lung cancers have been found at stage 1 or 2 — a near-complete reversal of the usual picture.
Stage 1 lung cancer has a good chance of cure. Stage 4 does not. That is the entire case for this programme, and it is a strong one.
Smoking cessation support is built into the check, and quit rates among people attending are markedly higher than in the general population. Being scanned appears to be a genuine prompt.
Stopping smoking will do more for your health than any scan — including reducing your lung cancer risk over the following years, and reducing your risk of heart disease considerably faster than that.
This is the newest of the UK screening programmes and it rests on stronger trial evidence than the NHS Health Check, though on a shorter track record than bowel or cervical screening.
Reviewed against UK National Screening Committee, NHS England Lung Cancer Screening Programme and published trial evidence current at the date shown above.
Uptake has been variable, and the pattern is a familiar one — lowest among the people at highest risk.
This deserves saying directly. Lung cancer carries a stigma that no other screened cancer carries, and a great many people avoid the check because they expect to be lectured or blamed.
The check is not a judgement, and nobody running it thinks you deserve lung cancer. If you smoked, you smoked — usually starting as a teenager, when tobacco was advertised and its risks were downplayed by the people selling it.
The single most useful thing this programme can do is find a cancer in someone who nearly did not go because they were embarrassed.
Screening is for people without symptoms. If you have any of these, you need assessment now:
NICE recommends an urgent chest X-ray for anyone aged 40 or over with an unexplained cough lasting more than three weeks. That applies whether or not you have ever smoked, and whether or not you have been screened.
A clear scan last year does not exclude a cancer that has appeared since.
Small nodules are found frequently, and the overwhelming majority are harmless. Old infections, scars, and benign growths all show up.
The consequence is repeat scans and months of uncertainty for people who turn out to have nothing wrong. That is a genuine cost, and for some people it is a distressing one.
A CT of the chest sees more than the lungs, and it routinely picks up things nobody was looking for:
Some of these matter. Most do not, and they generate further tests. This is worth expecting rather than being blindsided by.
Some screen-detected cancers would never have caused harm in the person's lifetime, and they are treated anyway.
The scale is thought to be smaller than in breast screening, because untreated lung cancer more reliably progresses — but it is not zero.
Yes. The programme covers anyone aged 55 to 74 recorded as having ever smoked.
Risk falls after stopping but never returns to that of a never-smoker, which is precisely why long-term ex-smokers are included.
They should not, and if they do that is a failure on their part. Most people started as teenagers when the risks were actively obscured.
Stigma is the biggest barrier to this programme, and it is the reason some cancers get found too late. Please go anyway.
Because your calculated risk came out below the threshold. It is not a refusal.
Scanning lower-risk people finds proportionately more harmless abnormalities than cancers, which does more harm than good.
The dose is low — considerably lower than a standard CT chest.
In this high-risk group the benefit clearly outweighs it, which is exactly why the programme is targeted rather than offered to everyone.
Almost certainly not. Small nodules are common and the overwhelming majority are harmless — old infections and scars.
A repeat scan checks whether it changes. That wait is uncomfortable, and it is the commonest experience in this programme.
Because the evidence of benefit comes from trials in high-risk smokers, and in never-smokers the balance of harms and benefits has not been established.
Lung cancer in never-smokers is real and rising. If you have symptoms, insist they are taken seriously — being a non-smoker is a recognised reason diagnoses get delayed.
Yes, and it is common. A chest CT sees the heart, thyroid, liver and other structures at the edges.
Most incidental findings turn out to be unimportant, though some — coronary calcium in particular — are genuinely useful.
Yes, and it will do more for you than the scans will.
Support is offered as part of the check and quit rates among attenders are notably high. Your heart risk starts falling within weeks.
Private low-dose CT screening exists, and it is worth asking what happens afterwards before booking. The value of the NHS programme lies in the risk assessment, the structured follow-up of nodules and the cessation support — not the scan alone.
A scan with no pathway behind it is worth considerably less, and can leave you holding a nodule result with nowhere to take it.
No — get seen now. Coughing blood needs assessment at any age, smoker or not.
Cancers arise between screening rounds, and a previous clear scan should never override a new symptom.
Clinically reviewed by Dr Mohammad Zubair Khan, GMC 7563469
Last reviewed
August 30, 2026
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£40 for 20 minutes
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Same-day access is usually available, from 6am to 10pm, seven days a week. You choose a time that suits you rather than waiting on hold at 8am.
Yes. Care is led personally by Dr Mohammad Khan, so you are not passed between clinicians. Continuity is the point of a small practice: someone who knows your history and is listening attentively rather than working through a checklist.
Yes, with your consent. We can access your Summary Care Record during the consultation, so your current medications, allergies and significant history are in the room. That means fewer questions you have already answered elsewhere, and safer prescribing.
No. We are not here to replace GPs, only to support them. Your NHS practice remains responsible for your ongoing care, and with your consent we write to them after the consultation. We are useful when you need to be seen sooner, or want more time than a standard appointment allows.
Twenty unhurried minutes and a comprehensive assessment. A written treatment plan is included, along with any prescription, sick note or referral letter arising from the consultation, at no extra charge.
£40 for 20 minutes, self-pay. Membership is optional and never required. Priced for fairness, because we are not here to charge extortionate amounts for access to a doctor.
It means the diagnosis can usually be made from your history and photographs, and that treatment can be arranged safely without examining you. Where a condition is not marked treatable online, it is because examination is the diagnosis — listening to a chest, feeling an abdomen, examining an ear or a joint — or because a procedure or device is needed.
Yes, where there is a genuine bacterial infection — cellulitis, impetigo, bacterial urine infections, confirmed strep throat. We will also frequently tell you that you do not need one. Most sore throats, coughs, colds and earaches are viral, and an antibiotic gives you the side effects with none of the benefit.
If your problem turns out to be genuinely outside what we can do remotely, the doctor will tell you straight away, point you to the right service, and refund your fee in full. We would rather do that than fill twenty minutes to justify the charge.
Call 999 or go to A&E — do not book an online appointment and do not wait for a reply to an email. For urgent problems that are not emergencies, NHS 111 is available 24 hours a day, online or by phone, and can direct you to the right service.
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