Improving Cancer Services

BACKGROUND
Improved management and organisation can enable cancer services to address a variety of issues that patients regard as important, such as waiting times, continuity of care, and of course clinical outcomes. But organisational change to bring about those quality improvements can be difficult to achieve.

AIMS
This conference will update participants on both the theory and practice o managing cancer services, using examples of initiatives from countries across Europe that have been successful in tackling national, regional, and local issues. It will also give participants opportunities to develop copllaborative projects that will improve the organisation of their cancer services, and to identify important issues that would benefit from research.

TARGET AUDIENCE
Managers, administrators, health professionals, policy makers and representatives of patients' groups who want to learn about how the organisation of their services could be improved. The conference will include time for small group discussion where participants consider topics that are of particular interest to them and explore possible collaborations between their organisations.

CONFERENCE VENUE
Grand Visconti Palace
Viele Isonzo 14, 20135 Milan, Italy
Tel. +39 02 540341

CERTIFICATE
A certificate of attendance will be distributed at the end of the conference

LANGUAGE
The official language of the conference is English

ORGANISING SECRETARIAT
Daniela Mengato - Francesca Marangoni
European School of Oncology
Viale Beatrice D'Este, 37
20122 Milan, Italy
Tel: +39 02 8546451
Fax: +39 02 85464545
Email: conferences@esoncology.org

ABSTRACT DEADLINE: 10th January 2005

Abstacts can be sent by e-mail to conferences@esoncology.org

INSTRUCTIONS FOR ABSTRACT SUBMISSION

Participants with information about a management or organisational initiative relevant to the subject of the conference may submit one abstract to be considered for poster presentation. Only papers whose abstracts have been reviewd and approved by the conference co-ordinators will be presented. All presenters must register as participants in the conference.

Abstracts should be written in English and the text should not exceed 2000 characters (title included). The abstract should include the following information:

1. Title and Introduction (state the initiative title; give a brief background to the initiative, including simple data that illustrate the problem);

2. Goal Statement (state the goals of your initiative succinctly);

3. Results (describe the results that have been achieved, providing supporting data where possible);

4. Changes Made (list the changes that lead to these results);

5. Conclusions (describe your conclusions from this work);

6. Future Plans (describe your next steps. What do you expect to accomplish between now and the conference? How do you expect your results to change?).

After submission, the corrisponding author will receive all the subsequent communication concerning this abstract. All authors may be required to complete a postal questionnaire about the subject of their presentation, as part of a research project being carried out in conjunction with the conference.

It is responsability of the presenting author to ascertain whether all authors are aware of the content of the abstract before submission.