Glossary of terms

Cancer information centres offer a range of services to cancer patients and their carers. A number of centres are participating in the national information pilots. Further information about information centres can be found at Macmillan Cancer Support.

A baseline audit was sent to every trust in England and to all 28 cancer networks, in order to:

• develop a baseline across England of the current spread of services and resources
• share resource locations and best practice with staff and where appropriate patients
• develop a BME-specific commissioning check list to assist commissioners commission for quality
• identify training and support needs for delivering culturally sensitive services
• develop a culturally sensitive core information pathway to be used alongside the national cancer information pathways.

BME stands for "Black and Minority Ethnic" and refers to individuals who may have specific language, cultural and religious requirements, which should be met if the service is to be both appropriate and effective for all patients.

The group, established by the National Cancer Action Team (NCAT), aims to ensure all National Cancer Patient Information Pathways are comprehensive and accurate, and easy to read and relevant to people affected by the disease. The role of the clinical reference group is to check the clinical accuracy of individual leaflets and content presented by content providers (charities and NHS trusts) for inclusion in the national cancer patient information pathways.

Cancer Reform Strategy

These are events in a cancer patient’s journey when information should be made available to help patients make decisions and provide useful information and advice.

The key stages are:

• prevention, awareness and early detection
• signs and symptoms
• screening (for breast and bowel only)
• referral
• tests and investigations
• diagnosis
• treatments
• ongoing and follow-up care
• living with and surviving cancer
• recurrence and secondary care
• palliative and end of life.

Patients will not go through these in sequence, but they may require information to support them at these key points in their patient journey.

The National BME Cancer Patient Advisory Panel has been developed to provide a national voice for BME patients, their carers and relatives to help improve the way the NHS delivers services to BME patients. To find out more about the panel, or to request an application pack, click here.

To date 11 national pathways have been developed and launched. These include: breast, bowel, lung, prostate, palliative care and end of life, vulva, womb, cervical, ovarian, vaginal and an ‘all cancer types’ pathway. Click here to see current content.

National Cancer Action Team

National Cancer Equality Initiative

The group, established by the National Cancer Action Team (NCAT), aims to ensure all National Cancer Patient Information Pathways are comprehensive and accurate, and easy to read and relevant to people affected by the disease. The role of the group is to look at content presented by content providers from a patient’s perspective and give their view on it, for example commenting on:

• The overall tone of the information
• Does it read well?
• Is it ‘helpful’ and ‘clear’?

Primary care includes your GP and community health staff. We will be working with primary care teams during 2009 to pilot the National Information Pathways and the electronic delivery system.

Secondary care includes your local Trusts, cancer centre and treatment centres. Our current information pilots are all in secondary care, with some being piloted in a hospice environment.