Pancreatic cancer is one of the fastest-killing forms of the disease for several reasons, not least that it is typically well advanced before it is identified.

Only about 10 per cent of patients in Ireland are still alive five years after diagnosis, says consultant medical oncologist Prof Gráinne O’Kane, who specialises in pancreatic cancer at St Vincent’s University Hospital in Dublin. (This compares with five-year survival rates of about 88 per cent for breast cancer and 93 per cent for prostate cancer.)

Yet, for the 600 people who develop this so-called silent cancer every year, there is still no rapid diagnostic clinic that would give them a better chance of survival.

We rightly have rapid diagnostic clinics for breast, prostate and lung cancer, she points out, but not for the aggressive pancreatic form. Despite being relatively rare, pancreatic cancer is projected to be the second leading cause of cancer-related deaths by 2030.

“If there is one that is going to need rapid access it should be that type of cancer, because if someone’s at home, losing ground, not knowing what’s going on, then you can miss a window of opportunity to treat that patient.”

Some tests may be carried out in the community but often not in the way she and her multidisciplinary team would like them to be done. Every week lost is going to make a difference.

“That’s where I guess a lot of us struggle. We see people that you just wish you had seen earlier, then things might not have progressed as much. As a pancreatic cancer grows and grows it gets harder to treat and patients are often sicker.”

Although the cancer is more likely to occur in patients in their 70s, “what is really frightening is that it is increasing in younger patients”. For unknown reasons, in common with other cancers such as colorectal cancer, more people under the age of 50 are being diagnosed.

“I would have many young people in their 40s. My youngest patient was 23 with pancreatic cancer.”

[ Pancreatic cancer: ‘I just can’t explain what it felt like hearing those words’Opens in new window ]

In seven to 10 per cent of cas