A new barometer for the assessment of QoL of cancer patients and survivors in Europe

The EUonQoL project is a European multi-stakeholder consortium, involving research institutions, cancer centres, as well as scientific, professional, and patient representative organisations, all with extensive experience and robust scientific background in the development of self-report QoL measures. It aims to develop, pilot, and validate a patient-driven and unified system for assessment of QoL (EUonQoL toolkit) in cancer patients and survivors across Europe.

This fully digital toolkit will allow the collection of QoL reports from cancer patients and survivors across Europe to inform policy changes at the EU level. The development of the EUonQoL toolkit will take into account different cancer populations to ensure a better representation of patients and survivors who have experienced different types of cancer. 

Project leaders from Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori (Italy), Dr Cinzia Brunelli and Prof Giovanni Apolone, shared that: “The plan is for the EUonQoL toolkit to be used repeatedly throughout the years to monitor how various EU cancer programmes have contributed to the quality of life of cancer patients and survivors.”

OECI is delighted to endorse the 24th World Congress of Psycho-Oncology 2023, which will be held in Milano, Italy, from 31st August to 3rd September 2023.

The theme for the meeting is: Championing our Patients’ Future Through Collaboration and Innovation in Psycho-Oncology. Moreover, 5 goals have been defined: innovation, education, equity, measuring efficacy, and sustainable psychology.

This Symposium will focus on the innovative methodological approaches used to develop a European Oncology Quality of Life toolkit (EUonQoL-Kit) among European cancer patients and survivors. Moreover, this Symposium will present the gaps in the body of evidence and in currently available QoL assessment tools, thus showing the main steps to overcome barriers and implement a standard European QoL assessment system.

The first presentation will give an overview of the H2020 European “EUonQoL” Project focusing on its rational and main ambitions, and introducing the methodologies used for the development of the toolkit.

Secondly, patients’ and stakeholders’ practical involvement to address their preferences will be showed.

The third presentation will summarize the existing evidence on the topics and identify gaps based on patients and stakeholder needs.

The fourth presentation will show the development of a method to validate Quality of Life scales using social network posts.

Lastly, the identification of psychosocial determinants of QoL affecting cancer patients’ experience will be presented, thus allowing a more comprehensive vision of QoL aspects in Europe.

This year, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) is thrilled to unveil a brand-new line-up of live online events, to be held during the IARC Summer School and open to the public.

Online viewers will be able to be in the virtual classroom, with the selected participants, and attend selected sessions of the modules “Introduction to Cancer Epidemiology” (EPI) and “Implementing Cancer Prevention and Early Detection” (PREV). All sessions will start at 13:00 CEST enabling attendees to join from all around the world.