National Lung Cancer Screening Program update
June 19, 2025
The Department of Health, Disability and Ageing (AGDOHA) is launching the National Lung Cancer Screening Program (NLCSP) from July 2025. Resources are available for the public and health care providers at: NLCSP Resources AGDOHA
Communicare: Supporting the National Lung Cancer Screening Program
New clinical items and the required Radiology Low Dose CT Referral template are now available for Communicare via a central update to support the NLCSP. Data from the clinical item will import directly into the linked Radiology Low Dose CT Referral template.
The clinical items assist with recording the data required for the National Cancer Screening Register (NCSR) enrolment and the ordering of the program-specific low dose CT scan with the clinical details to support the radiologists’ decision-making.
NLCSP Communicare Information Pack
A Communicare Information Pack has been prepared to assist you with your implementation of the NLCSP at your health service. The information pack contains:
- Suggested reports for identifying patients who are potentially eligible for the NLCSP;
- Information on how the clinical items are structured; and
- Suggestions on recalls that you may wish your Communicare Administrator to set up for your workflows. Please note that recalls cannot be distributed centrally, they must be entered directly in your Communicare database.
Please review the information pack with your Communicare Administrator and discuss how you will implement your NLCSP workflows. You may wish to clone and amend the clinical items to suit your local workflows.
The Communicare Information Pack can be downloaded here: Communicare NLCSP Information.
Implementing NLCSP functionality
Distribution of the new clinical items and linked Radiology Low Dose CT Referral template will require a central update (this is not an upgrade) by the Communicare Service Desk. Note: This is unlikely to be finalised for all sites before 1 July.
If you wish to enroll a patient in the NLCSP and order a low-dose CT-scan before the clinical items are available, you can download the following NLCSP Low Dose CT Referral template into Communicare. This will need to be completed manually to accompany the imaging request so that the radiologist has the required information. Your Communicare Administrator can download the temporary NLCSP Low Dose CT Referral Template here: NLCSP Low Dose CT Referral (free text clinical information) Template (Once download complete, you will need to RH click and ‘save as’ to put the XML file on your local drive so that you can import it into Communicare templates).
Once the central update is complete, manual written free text entry of the clinical information for the Low Dose CT Referral template will no longer be required.
Our Service Desk will be working with customers to update the central database to deliver these clinical items over the next few weeks (Note: this is not an upgrade). Please check with your Communicare Administrator to confirm when these are available.
If you propose to start your NLCSP immediately, please submit a ticket to the Communicare Service Desk with the following subject: ‘Requesting a central update for new clinical items’ to fast-track your central update.
National Cancer Screening Register (NCSR)
If you have not already done so, this would also be a good opportunity to have the National Cancer Screening Register integration activated in your Communicare software. Communicare integrates with the NCSR Healthcare Provider Portal to display alerts from the NCSR and allow healthcare provider access to participant data. See the Communicare Knowledge Centre for further information: National Cancer Screening Register
For all Communicare support queries, please submit a ticket to the Communicare Service Desk.