Oncology Professional Care has been designed to meet your educational needs with CPD points available for attendees. Across the two days, content has been streamed into three areas, to match the interests and needs of a diverse range of attendees:

• Improving early detection and diagnosis
• Advanced cancer treatments and technologies
• Transforming cancer care pathways

Improving early detection and diagnosis

A fundamental part of the NHS Long Term Plan is to improve early detection with an ambition for 75% of patients to be diagnosed at stage 1 or stage 2. This equates to 55,000 more people being diagnosed each year and will lead to higher survival rates. Other major aims include the introduction of the faster diagnosis standard and the roll-out of Rapid Diagnostic Centres (RDCs) which has been proceeding despite the pandemic. Expert speakers Dr Richard Roope, Maria Hawkins and Geraint Jones will be presenting around these issues and examples of good practice.

A key plank of the plan is the roll-out of lung health checks which has produced good results in some areas of the country already. The joint clinical lead and consultant radiologist Arjun Nair, responsible for the Targeted Lung Health Checks programme, will be talking about early findings from the programme and sharing best practice.

Advanced cancer treatments and technologies

Cancer survival rates have been improving for two decades but there is still more to do to catch up with the outcomes performance of other countries. There is a lot of low-hanging fruit which has been identified in the NHS Long Term Plan, but longer-term radical innovation and reinvention of services needs to take place to move the dial faster on cancer survival rates. Sessions in this stream focus on robotics, AI, genomics, new drugs and therapies, new approaches to radiotherapy – including proton radiotherapy, to ensure we have one eye on the future and the cutting edge of cancer diagnosis and treatment.

We’re delighted Yen Chang and Maria Hawkins who are responsible for proton beam therapy at University College London are on hand to talk about approaches to radiotherapy. Deborah Lakeland from Lancashire and South Cumbria ICS will be presenting on advances in genomics for cancer.

Transforming cancer care pathways

Cancer care is changing because of the pandemic with new developments transforming the patient experience. More people are surviving from cancer and the subject of living beyond cancer is now becoming a major part of the pathway. Added to this is the advent of integrated care with system working now in vogue and meaning cancer alliances need to be more joined up with Integrated Care Systems (ICSs) and Primary Care Networks (PCNs).

There are good examples of collaborative working developing in local areas and Oncology Professional Care is providing a platform for good practice. Wessex Cancer Alliance are presenting on their innovative primary care wide strategy and how it is contributing to the aims of the NHS Long Term Plan. Thames Valley Cancer Alliance will also present on the new models of care they’re adopting in their locality and the contribution it is making to cancer pathways.