Due to the various challenges and limited resources in paediatric oncology, promoting and supporting collaborative clinical trials within Europe, furthering education and training for health professionals, increasing awareness on and around childhood cancers and improving information exchange and dissemination across borders is implicit.
Thanks to the European Commission’s Seventh Framework Health (FP7) topic announced last year, ‘Structuring clinical research in paediatric and adolescent oncology in Europe’, ENCCA - the European Network for Cancer research in Children and Adolescents will do just that. By integrating key stakeholders from the European paediatric oncology community including a network of 33 institutions, SMEs, professional organisations including ECCO and ECCO Founding Member SIOP Europe (SIOPE), and patients and their families through ICCCPO -the International Confederation of Childhood Cancer Parent Organisations, ENCCA is dedicated to knowledge share, dissemination as well as accelerating the development of innovative therapeutic strategies in childhood and adolescent oncology across Europe.
As a SIOPE-led initiative, this network will be coordinated by SIOPE President, Ruth Ladenstein (Children’s Cancer Research Institute, Vienna) and supported by the network’s Vice-Chair Gilles Vassal (Institut Gustave Roussy, Villejuif, France). Distinguished clinicians Kathy Pritchard-Jones and Martin Schrappe will also lend their essential support in managing this exciting initiative. Negotiations with the European Commission are now finalised and activities are expected to commence in early 2011.
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