Introduction Due to pandemic restrictions we established a new early diagnosis service for patients with reflux symptoms and those on our existing Barrett’s surveillance programme using Cytosponge as initial investigation. As this was the first time Cytosponge had been used in routine clinical practice in this setting it was important to involve patients in the evaluation of the service.

Methods The service was established in a district general hospital with catchment area 600,000. All patients who had a Cytosponge procedure between 01/05/2021 and 31/01/2022 were asked to complete a one-page survey about their experience on the same day as the procedure, prior to leaving the hospital. The survey contained demographic data and questions regarding their degree of discomfort using a visual analogue scale as well as whether they had had a previous endoscopy, and which one they preferred, if they thought the test was acceptable and whether they would be willing to have a Cytosponge again. There was also space for free text comments.

Results 299 patients completed the survey at least partially. No patients declined to participate. 52% were female, 93% described themselves as white ethnicity 4% as Asian/Asian British, 1.6% as Black or Black British,1.4% as Mixed/other.

Only 9/295 (3%) respondents felt that Cytosponge was an unacceptable test. 12% described no discomfort, 80% mild or minimal discomfort, 3% moderate discomfort, 5% severe/significant discomfort. 281 patients (94%) would be willing to have a Cytosponge again.

157/297 (53%) reported having a previous gastroscopy.86% preferred Cytosponge to gastroscopy.

Conclusions These results support previous data from the BEST studies, and are the first large dataset showing the excellent acceptability of Cytosponge in the real-world setting. The evidence from patients for their preference for Cytosponge over gastroscopy will also give support for its use as in Barrett’s surveillance programmes going forward where multiple gastroscopies were previously required.