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Cancer World Newsletter - Spotlight on: What did we learn from the European Partnership for Action Against Cancer? |
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As the European Comprehensive Cancer Control Joint Action (CANCON) gets underway, this Spotlight article takes a close look at its predecessor, EPAAC. Did EPAAC deliver on its aim of helping EU member states improve the way they organise and deliver cancer prevention, screening and care? What are the implications for collaborating over cancer in the future?
What do you think?
- Were you aware of, or involved in, EPAAC projects in your own area of work?
- If so, did you feel collaborating across member states added value?
- How can member states best share experiences and learn from one another when health systems vary so widely across Europe?
- Is it valuable to be able to compare the effectiveness and efficiency of national cancer services?
- If so, why shouldn’t this sort of work be supported by a standing body rather than a series of short-term projects?
You can read the article here. Press the comment button at the end and share your views.
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The EU Health Prize for Journalists has selected its winners for a fifth consecutive year! |
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The winners were announced by Health Commissioner, Mr Tonio Borg, at an award ceremony in Brussels on the 8th of April. Out of more than 850 articles entered into the competition, 28 national finalists were chosen by juries in each EU country. Amidst the shortlist of 28 excellent articles, the winners are:
1st place: Henk Blanken writing for Dagblad van het Noorden (the Netherlands) for his article “Carel’s Head", a story which follows a young man suffering from Parkinson's disease from diagnosis to treatment, and gives a detailed and emotional account of the pioneering surgery he receives.
2nd place: Christiane Hawranek and Marco Maurer, writing for Die Zeit (Germany) for their sharp, ‘documentary-style’ article “The Patient Traffickers” which highlights dubious practices in non-regulated medical care across borders.
3rd place: Mette Dahlgaard writing for the Berlingske newspaper (Denmark) for “Am I Killing Someone?”, the story of a sperm donor who discovers that he carries the gene for a highly hereditary form of cancer, but hits a brick wall when he tries to find a way of warning potential children who could be affected.
You can find more information on the winners in the Journalist's Prize website: http://ec.europa.eu/health-eu/journalist_prize/2013/winners/index_en.htm
We would greatly appreciate if you could help us promote the winners through your contacts/media. You can also find the video of the award ceremony and pictures in the links below:
http://ec.europa.eu/avservices/video/player.cfm?sitelang=en&;ref=I088359
http://ec.europa.eu/avservices/photo/photoByReportage.cfm?ref=025454&;sitelang=fr
You can also follow us on Twitter at @EU_Health and like us on FB at https://www.facebook.com/pages/EU-Health-Prize-for-Journalists/109464325763850
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How can we help you? The European School of Oncology is stepping up the support it offers to promote good journalism about cancer in 2014 |
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Cancer World Newsletter: Imaging in oncology - over a century of advances |
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Imaging techniques that tell us as much as possible about a cancer are becoming an essential part of the development of precision medicine. This e-grandround presents a unique overview that brings together all the developments in the field from the discovery of X-rays in 1895 to the wealth of techniques using MRI, PET and CT being used and further developed today. This is not just of interest to radiologists. To get the best information they can when selecting therapeutic options and assessing response to that treatment, clinicians need to understand the weaknesses as well as the strengths of each imaging technique, and that no single imaging technique can provide all the answers.
What do you think?
- How wide a selection of imaging techniques do you use in your daily practice?
- Could some of your treatment decisions be improved by the sort of detailed information that can be captured by the latest sophisticated imaging techniques?
You can read the article here. Press the comment button at the end and share your views.
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Concrete, decisive action to advance childhood cancer research, treatment and care are expected from the new Members of the European Parliament: Press Release, Brussels, 19 February 2014 |
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SIOPE effectively challenged the European institutions and civil society to act and support children and young adults with cancer on 18th February 2014 at the European Parliament.
On this occasion several Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) from different countries and party groups, including candidates running for the upcoming European elections in May, agreed to endorse the SIOPE-ENCCA-ICCCPO electoral Manifesto for Paediatric Oncology, a fundamental document which unites all stakeholders around concrete objectives to advance childhood cancer research, treatment and care.
The Manifesto has been already signed by MEPs Pr Philippe Juvin (France, EPP), Dr Antonyia Parvanova (Bulgaria, ALDE), Mr Alojz Peterle (Slovenia, EPP) and Ms Glenis Willmott (UK, S&D), and it is currently open for endorsement on our website by all those who care for the future of children affected by cancer.
During the high-level event ‘Tackling inequalities in paediatric cancer care and research across Europe’, whichMEP Ms Glenis Willmott kindly agreed to host and whichwasco-chaired by MEPs Ms Linda McAvan (UK, S&D) and Mr Alojz Peterle (Slovenia, EPP), some key areas of work have been identified:
- Clinical trials are the foundation of progress in paediatric oncology, and they should be better regulated at the European level;
- Patients from all over Europe should have a greater access to clinical trials and state-of-the-art treatment and care;
- Childhood cancer registries are essential to monitor treatment outcomes, and should be implemented in all European countries;
- Sustainable support for childhood cancer survivors and long-term follow up should be provided across Europe;
- Healthcare professionals working in paediatric oncology should have continued access to medical education;
- More information on the disease and its treatment should be made available to patients and their families;
- Strategic partnership with parent/patient organisations is a driver of positive change;
- Outcome research should be enhanced in Europe.
The event provided a platform for all relevant stakeholders to speak on the burning issues from their unique perspectives. Childhood cancer parents and survivors, as well as paediatric oncologists and representatives from the European Commission and the Committee of the Regions actively described all the hurdles currently hampering patients’ and survivors’ access to standard treatment and care in different regions of Europe.
On the basis of the findings from the EUROCARE 5 report on childhood cancer survival, and on the recommendations set by the European Standards of Care for Children with Cancer, all speakers and panellists agreed on the need to increase the cure rate for poor prognosis paediatric malignancies and to enhance the quality of cure in survivors, addressing the existing inequalities in terms of research and care. The importance of reinforcing the collaboration between all stakeholders was central to the event.
The paediatric oncology multidisciplinary community has the potential to bring about a breakthrough in cancer research and care, leading to major impact on the lives of childhood cancer patients, parents and survivors.
EVENT INFORMATION: ‘Tackling inequalities in paediatric cancer care and research across Europe’
18th February 2014, European Parliament, Brussels, Belgium
Event webpage
MEDIA CONTACTS: Prof Gilles Vassal, SIOPE President (Samira Essiaf,
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
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Cancer World Newsletter - Five steps to putting innovation at the heart of cancer care |
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Finding new and better ways to do things is the only way to keep improving cancer care in an era where costs and demand are rising and healthcare budgets are not. But how can we inject the search for innovation into every aspect of cancer care, and streamline the way we develop, test and roll out cost-effective techniques, products and practices that can make a real difference to patients? ESO invited key figures from patient advocacy, cancer care and the pharmaceutical and diagnostics industries to share their experiences with leading policy makers, health economists, health technology assessors, and regulators, and asked them all to come up with a plan. The discussion and its conclusions are presented in this Systems &Services article.
What do you think?
- Could care be improved and resources be used more efficiently if healthcare systems were more open to innovation and change?
- Have you been involved in initiating and evaluating different ways of working?
- If not, why not?
- If you have, did you get the backing and support you needed?
- What would be the single most important change required to make your working environment more open to evaluating and adopting new products, techniques and ways of working?
You can read the article here. Press the comment button at the end and share your views.
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Cancer World Newsletter - Best Reporter: Challenging the sceptics with stories of hope |
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Journalists can’t treat cancer. But they can help change attitudes about the need and the possibilities for others to do so. This is what radio journalist Joanne Silberner did with a series of reports from Haiti, Uganda and India, broadcast by Public Radio International, in which doctors and patients tell their stories about the suffering cancer causes and about the low-tech cost-effective ways they are using to tackle it. In this Best Reporter article, Joanne talks about why she chose to cover this topic and about the people she talked to.
- Have you read anything in a newspaper, magazine or online recently that stands out as an important contribution to raising awareness about cancer and promoting informed discussion about prevention, treatment, research or the challenges of living with the disease?
- Can you think of any journalist with a particularly good track record of writing about cancer?
If so, please nominate them for ESO’s 2014 Best Cancer Reporter Award, so we can acknowledge their valuable work and encourage more quality media coverage of cancer. You can read the article here. Nomination forms can be downloaded here.
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Health-EU newsletter 122 - Focus Cancer |
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By Martin Seychell, Deputy Director-General for Consumers and Health, European Commission
Cancer - we hear about it almost every day on the news, at work or in discussions with family and friends. Given the incidence rates prevailing nowadays in the European Union, one in three men and one in four women could be directly affected by cancer in the first 75 years of their lives. Cancer is the second biggest cause of death after heart diseases in the European Union. Every year, it claims over one and a half million lives and changes the destiny of another 2.5 million citizens diagnosed with it. With the population ageing, the cancer death toll is set to increase even further.
As Deputy Director-General for Consumers and Health, my objective is to tackle cancer on all fronts. On the one hand, by boosting research and cooperation, we can ensure that efficient treatments are developed to treat cancer patients across the EU. On the other hand, by raising awareness about cancer prevention our ambitious goal is to reduce new cancer cases by 15% by 2020.
Cancer has been at the heart of EU policies since 1985 when the Commission and the then 12 Member States launched the “Europe against Cancer” programme and the first "European Code against Cancer". The Code is currently being updated on the basis of the latest scientific findings. Its purpose is to help all citizens adopt healthy lifestyles and to attend early screenings once they reach a certain age.
We all have a part to play in meeting this huge challenge. It starts with each and every-one of us choosing the path of prevention and early cancer detection. Today, I wish to call on all citizens, so that they take control over their lives by adopting healthy lifestyles, and by undergoing potentially life-saving screenings once they reach a critical age.
Read the full edition of the Newsletter.
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Cancer World Newsletter - Cutting Edge. Approval rating: how do the EMA and FDA compare? |
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Europe’s EMA takes on average more than half a year longer to grant marketing approval to new cancer therapies, and the two regulators sometime differ over the patient groups and setting for which the licence is given. In this Cutting Edge article we ask what lies behind these disparities and look ahead at the regulatory challenges posed by new generations of cancer therapies.
What do you think?
- Is the lengthy approval time in Europe inevitable given the EU’s federal structure, or are approvals being held up by unnecessary bureaucracy?
- How well do judgements made by regulators reflect the priorities of the patients and the public that they serve?
- Is there a need for greater transparency on the reasoning and value judgements behind regulatory decisions, or is the EMA a model of openness compared with many other bodies that take important decisions affecting our healthcare.
You can read the article here. Press the comment button at the end and share your views.
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