Site last updated:
July 2010
Cancer Services Forum currently has 713 registered members
Cancer Services Forum is a publication aimed at PCO commissioners and their teams, cancer network management teams, service managers in cancer centres and cancer units, clinicians, pharmacists, nurses and other cancer care professionals.
The pace of change in the planning, commissioning and delivery of UK cancer services can be overwhelming — the aim of Cancer Services Forum is to communicate expert opinion on the implications of cancer policy and service initiatives on a regular basis, frequently and in a timely fashion.
Latest
Payment by Results for chemotherapy—challenges and solutions
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Establishing and effectively maintaining a tariff for chemotherapy, within our current financial restrictions, is going to be key in managing costs and ensuring prescription appropriateness in of one of the most costly areas of medicine.
In this month’s issue of Cancer Services Forum, Anne Hines modestly describes her tour through the highly complex and challenging process of defining this tariff as ‘merely a cursory look’. In essence, Anne provides an excellent overview of a long and drawn out project that many of us have only a partial understanding of. A process that has been beset with difficulties, including poor Trust data collection, inter and intra Trust prescribing variability and within a specialty that is constantly changing in response to research advances.
New technologies for cervical cancer screening
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The insight in recent years into the causative link between human papillomavirus (HPV) and cervical cancer has opened the door to a national vaccination programme, which is now underway in the target age groups. The link may also have implications for the way that the NHS cervical screening programme is organised, as this month’s edition of Cancer Services Forum explains.
In his informative article, Jack Cuzick presents evidence for the validity of HPV testing as an adjunct to conventional cervical cytology. Of particular interest to those involved in the commissioning and organisation of cancer services, he proposes an algorithm for cervical screening, in which cytology is reserved for women who are HPV-positive, thereby reducing the demand on cytology services. Professor Cuzick also sheds light on the emerging technology of immunostaining, which may eventually have a role in cervical screening.
2010 General Election: promises, promises…
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As the country gears itself up for a General Election in May, what are the implications for health, and in particular cancer?
The public media has already started using health issues, and cancer in particular, to tease out debate, and though the three main parties have openly named health as a key election priority, only two have specific plans for cancer. One thing is for sure, we will have heard much during their campaign as the footballs of health and cancer are kicked around the political playing field.
