We are delighted to share our Cancer Services vision for the next five years by introducing our new cancer strategy.

Our cancer strategy describes how we will meet the national priorities for cancer; achieve the expectations of our patients and their families and create integrated services to meet the needs of our communities.

A cancer strategy like this is essential for our Trust because it provides a clear explanation of our plans and shows where we would like to be as an organisation in the future.  The strategy sets out how we will monitor and demonstrate we have made progress with set milestones in place to help us check we are achieving our plans and enable us to take further action if needed.

The cancer strategy doesn’t detail every specific action we must take to meet our ambitions, but it does describe our broader plans and forms the blueprint from which the more specific actions are taken.  The strategy is ambitious and being ambitious is important for our Trust, for our staff, but most importantly for our patients.

The challenging healthcare landscape we are currently experiencing presents an opportunity for us to work in new ways, breaking down barriers and developing innovative solutions to deliver high quality cancer care to all parts of our health and social care system.

We also know that patient needs are changing, with the better health awareness and more varied treatment options for patients, patients are being diagnosed earlier and living longer, meaning a greater focus on the ‘whole person’ care of patients, not just their disease, and a life with or beyond cancer diagnosis and treatment.

Providing great cancer care requires partnership working, GPs and hospitals working together to provide seamless care to patients. It is the culmination of all the actions of the multidisciplinary team caring for the patient, ensuring the care is wrapped around the patient and continues beyond and into life living with or beyond cancer that makes it seamless.  This strategy will guide us through the transformation required to deliver great cancer care alongside our values which remain constant. We always put patients at the centre of everything that we do.