• Education projects
• Biological therapies
• BONE
• Breast cancer care
• BREATHE
• Cancer tales
• EPAAC / PEPs
• Partnership project
• Skeletal Care Academy
• Speak-up
• target
• TITAN
• Past projects

European Partnership for Action Against Cancer

The European Partnership for Action Against Cancer was initiated by the EU Commission in September 2009 with the support of a number of stakeholders bringing together the Commission, Member States and their Ministries of Health, patient organisations, health professionals, scientists, private industry and civil society. It has embarked on an ambitious agenda of a pan-European collaborative effort to tackle cancer more evenly and effectively across the EU. At this point, EONS was invited to join the project as it was wished that nurses are directly involved in the activities of EPAAC. EONS involvement and contribution to EPAAC was highlighted in a written statement which included nursing contributions in the fields of prevention, identification & promotion of good practice in cancer-related healthcare, cancer nursing research and in education and training.

Clair Watts, EONS CEO was present at the first meeting in Brussels. At this meeting, she presented a summary about EONS, it’ structure and governance,strategies and activities.

The major goals of the European Partnership for Action Against Cancer are two-fold:

• To help all EU countries tackle cancer more evenly and effectively by sharing information, resources, best practice and expertise
• To avoid fragmented and duplicated effort and maximise the limited resources available - by coordinating action on cancer involving member countries, scientific experts, patient organisations and other key stakeholders.

The four pillars of the Cancer Partnership are:

• Prevention (Health promotion and early detection)
• Identification and promotion of good practice in cancer-related healthcare
• Priorities for cancer research
• Health information, collection and analysis of comparable data.

To accomplish this, the EPAAC project has been divided into 10 Work Package groups.

• WP 1: Coordination, Steering Group
• WP 2: Dissemination and Virtual Partnership
• WP 3: Evaluation
• WP 4: Open Forum and Secretariat
• WP 5: Health and Promotion
• WP 6: Screening and diagnosis
• WP 7: Healthcare
• WP 8: Research
• WP 9: Information and Data
• WP 10: National Cancer Plans

EONS involvement

EONS will contribute to the review undertaken by EHMA and provide feedback from European nurses and cancer nursing organizations on Clinical Guideline implementation and barriers. EONS will be leading part of this work package in developing European language translations of nursing evidence reviews and facilitating implementation of these into practice.

Work package 7: Healthcare

There is comprehensive evidence that significant European variability exists in both delivery of services and outcomes of care. Cancer outcomes could be improved if the broader range of activities and services for cancer were performed at the higher levels seen in the better performing health systems. Key elements for better cancer care consist of the following:

• rapid access to diagnosis
• multidisciplinary care
• coordination of cancer care throughout the process from diagnosis to therapy, including palliative care
• provision of psychosocial care services
• consideration of patient preferences in the clinical decision-making process
• use of evidence-based therapeutic guidelines.

The work package will have a particular focus on new organizational perspectives in cancer care, specifically networks of cancer care at regional level and for low frequency tumours. Evidence also suggests that evidence-based guidelines in cancer are often not put into practice, hampering improvement in cancer care and patient outcomes. This work package will therefore also focus on issues of implementation for managers and clinicians, and a key focus will be team working across these disciplines. EONS will be concentrating on the development and evaluation of PEP guidelines over the next 3 years. This will be done in collaboration with the ONS (USA). European clinical nurse experts as well as selected clinical settings will in the near future be directly invited and involved to work with EONS on this very important project.

Phase 1. Evaluation and modification into a European format

The PEPs guidelines will be evaluated and modified into a European format by a panel of European clinical experts provided by EONS, translated into 5 European languages. Please go the Further information section of this page to see the list of clinical experts and selected PEPs guidelines.

Phase 2. Putting Evidence into Practice (PEPs) Implementation Workshop:

EONS invites nurses to participate in the first European PEPs workshop which will take place on Friday 21 and Saturday 22 September 2012 in Brussels, Belgium. This workshop is funded jointly by the European Union and EONS to promote good practice in symptom management related cancer care. Fundamental to this is sharing best practice and using existing evidence to enhance practice. Implementing evidence based guidelines are objectives of this project. The first step in this project is the workshop. Following this, a second step is required committing to using and piloting the guidelines in practice.

Format of EPAAC project participation

The workshop is the start of the implementation project and you will be asked to implement 2 of the PEP guidelines in your own hospital or clinical setting within 6 months of the workshop and provide a short evaluation. Your manager, supervisor or charge nurse is also invited to the event and a letter of sponsorship required from your institution.

What’s your manager’s role in the project?

Your manager should lead the implementation; take responsibility for planning and managing overall use of the PEP providing clinical support for nurses involved plus leading the evaluation.

What’s your role as an oncology nurse in the project?

You provide the clinical oncology nursing input and the practical day to day perspective for implementation of the guidelines. Experience in symptom management and working clinically with patients is essential. Your role is to liaise with staff to facilitate wider involvement on your ward or institution. You participate in project implementation actions.

Required is a letter of support from your institution to commit to piloting and evaluation of two of the chosen PEPs. This sponsor provides administrative leadership and commitment from the institution.

Putting Evidence into Practice Workshop

The workshop will provide tips for symptom management, encouraging guideline adoption and be linked with discussion of clinical complexity as well as exemplars of implementing new symptom management strategies. Two intensive days of up-to-date evidence for symptom management and the latest research evidence will help improve clinical skills and patient care.

Addressing how to change and enhance patient care through practice development will underpin clinical symptom knowledge, exploring existing barriers and difficulties in using guidelines and how to make change.

This workshop will be conducted by an international faculty of experts. Following the workshop nurses will be encouraged to use the guidelines in practice. Please go the Further information section of this page to see the workshop agenda and the faculty list.

Attendance to the workshop is by application only and successful applicants are granted FREE registration and accommodation. Travel on economy basis will be refunded after the event.

The application deadline is 18th June 2012.

>>  Apply for this workshop

Work package 8: Cooperation and coordination of cancer research

EPAAC's Work Package 8 (cooperation and coordination of cancer research) is running a survey in oncology research with the aim to improve coordination & cooperation of cancer research across Europe. Oncology research nurses are invited to complete the survey to ensure the nursing voice is included. The survey can be accessed here:
>>  Complete the survey

EONS participation

Several meetings where EONS participation was called for have already taken place the most recent ones, in Barcelona and Madrid.

In Barcelona, Sara Faithfull represented EONS and presented an overview of the EONS project to all the Working Package groups. The First Open Forum, 14-15 June 2011 in Spain and focused on two areas: cancer healthcare and research. In Madrid. Anita Margulies represented EONS and presented an introduction to the upcoming e-PEP's , the problems of guidelines, and the inequalities within the healthcare professional settings.

Anita Margulies BSN RN
Executive Board Member

Websites

>>  http://ec.europa.eu/health/ph_information/dissemination/diseases/docs/com_2009_291_en.pdf
>>  http://epaac.h3.si/home
>>  http://www.ecpc-online.org/health-in-eu/cancer-partnership.html
>>  http://ec.europa.eu/health/major_chronic_diseases/diseases/cancer/epaac/index_en.html