EuroCancerComS (2010 – 2012)
Eurocancercoms was funded by Science in Society in the context of the EU 7th framework programme (FP7). Full details about project partners can be found here.
Research Context: The lack of efficient communication among cancer scientists, health professionals, patients and policy makers remains a significant barrier to collaboration in the European Union (EU). The recently completed EUROCAN PLUS project surveyed all constituents in Europe involved in some way or another with the cancer research “business” and concluded unanimously that information overload and an overwhelmingly fractionated, exhaustive array of resources, networks and knowledge providers are seriously hindering the translation, application and implementation of research across Europe. With the constant explosion of data we can expect to face increasingly challenging times for co-ordinated, reliable and effective scientific dissemination and communication.
The EU needs to establish an integrated model for a Europe-wide comprehensive cancer information and policy exchange portal. Such a model could subsequently be applied to other areas of healthcare, such as cardiology, neurobiology etc.
Cancer is a good model as its science is far advanced, subspecialisation within basic and clinical research has splintered the area into hundreds of boxes, and its impact on the health of Europeans is a significant issue. As the population ages, deaths due to cancer are expected to rise from around one million to almost double within a quarter of a century. Worldwide, the WHO has now declared that cancer causes more deaths globally than malaria, AIDs and tuberculosis added together. There is at present no workable model centralised or networked which even begins to address the communication challenges within this area of health science.
Objectives: (a) Improve dissemination of scientific results to cancer professionals, (b) Improve dissemination of cancer research results to cancer patients and the public, (c) Improve dissemination of information within cancer research societies and organisations, (d) Validate open access publishing models, (f) Report on future of impact factor and citation indices, (g) Report on the future of the peer review system, (h) Assess solutions for dissemination of raw data and presentation of results, pre peer review, and (i) Develop a Policy on the future of Virtual communications by cancer communities.
Publications: Please visit the ‘Publications’ page.
