A pain in her side sent her to Liverpool Hospital one night in June. Doctors diagnosed her with pancreatic cancer. They caught it early, and they could cut it out.

Pancreatic cancer is dwarfed by the awareness campaigns of other cancers with high incidence rates, but the oft-forgotten condition has the poorest survival rate of them all, with less than seven per cent of patients still alive five years after diagnosis.

The low number of cases and the large proportion of inoperable tumours mean many NSW hospitals have little experience performing pancreatectomies.

"Everyone knows about breast cancer, lung cancer, brain cancer. But when they told me what I had I said 'pancreas? What's that?'" said Mrs Thompson, 56.

The Sydney mother and accounts officer was diagnosed at Liverpool Hospital, but the staff perform very few pancreatectomies on site. Instead, Mrs Thompson was referred to Bankstown Lidcombe Hospital, which performs between six to 11 pancreatectomies a year.

"I was offered surgery as soon as I was diagnosed. I had no reservations," Mrs Thompson said.

"It was a blessing knowing I could have surgery when so many people with pancreatic cancer don't get that opportunity."

The chances of a patient with pancreatic cancer receiving potentially life-saving surgery varies greatly depending on where they live, found an analysis of NSW data.

Being diagnosed with the condition in the regions with the lowest surgery rates halved a person's chance of survival, with some patients  almost three times less likely to be offered pancreatic cancer surgery than others, found the study published in the Medical Journal of Australia on Monday.

The proportion of pancreatic cancer patients receiving surgery ranged from as little as 8 per cent to 21 per cent across NSW between 2010 and 2013, found the study led by researchers at the Cancer Institute of NSW.

The chances of living past five years after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer was as low as 3.4 per cent for patients in regions with low surgery rates compared with 7.2 per cent for regions where surgery was performed most frequently, found the study that de-identified the regions.

Just 14 per cent of people diagnosed with the condition underwent a pancreatectomy over the study period.

"We see clearly that areas with higher proportions of patients being offered surgery have five-year survival rates twice that of those people in regions with lower proportions of surgery," said chief executive at the Cancer Institute NSW, Dr David Currow.

Patients and their GPs needed to seek out hospitals that had performed a high volume of pancreatic surgery, Dr Currow said.

"To increase surgery rates, we need to ensure that people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer are being referred to specialist centres with the resources to manage complex care.

"It's important a well-oiled team is not only performing the surgery, but assessing the patients before and after the procedure," he said.

Hospitals recommended by the Cancer Institute of NSW have a minimum caseload of six pancreatectomies per year.

In Sydney, North Shore Private hospital performs the most panreatectomies per year (31 to 35). Royal North Shore performs 26-30, followed by Bankstown/Lidcombe, Westmead and Royal Prince Alfred each performing 16 to 20 annually.

Prince of Wales Private and St George Private hospitals each perform 11 to 15 pancreatectoies annually. Sydney Adventist Private, Prince of Wales, St George and St Vincent's Hospital perform between six and 10 per year.

South Western Sydney, where Mrs Thompson lives, has one of the highest mortality rates for pancreatic cancer in the state, with 10.7 deaths per 100,000 people, higher than the NSW average of 9.7 per 100,000, according to the latest data from 2008 to 2012.

Nepean Blue Mountains also had pancreatic cancer death rates higher than the state average, with 10.4 per 100,000.

Both Sydney local health districts had a far higher rate late stage pancreatic cancer cases than the state average, and fewer early-stage detections, which would greatly influence survival rates.

There was a complex mix of reasons  behind the wide variations in surgery and mortality rates, Dr Currow said.

"A number of patients may not want surgery, and some general practitioners may not realise that people with early stage [pancreatic cancer] may benefit from surgery," said Dr Currow, who was a study co-author.

"The message here is that if you are diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, have your care overseen by a multidisciplinary team.

"GPs are crucial in this. Making sure GPs know where and when to refer patients with pancreatic cancer is an important next step. The benefits from surgery has changed dramatically in the last few years, and techniques have improved over that time," he said.

If surgery rates were raised by 18 per cent in the regions where the fewest people were currently undergoing surgery,  32 additional people could receive surgery in NSW every year, the researchers said.