About the Network

The role of the Network is to:

• Develop all aspects of local cancer services, prevention, screening, diagnosis, treatments, supportive care and specialist palliative care
• Develop multi-disciplinary teams and make arrangements to ensure that all patients are reviewed by them prior to treatment
• Agree common protocols and service patterns to tackle variations and make best use of resources available
• Develop workforce education, training and facility strategies

We link with NHS Improvement, the National Cancer Action Team and the National Cancer Intelligence Network to address issues around high incidence and mortality and low survival.

Which Organisations are Associated with the Network?

The Network covers a population of 1.6 million people and encompasses one Strategic Health Authority, six Primary Care Trusts, four Acute Hospital Trusts and seven Hospices.

What are Cancer Networks?

Currently, there are 28 Cancer Networks across the country whose populations range in size from 600,000 to 3 million.  The Cancer Networks were established following the recommendations of the Calman-Hine Report (1995) and the more recent NHS Cancer Plan (September 2000) and the Manual of Cancer Standards (April 2001).

Cancer Networks bring together a range of organisations; those who provide services and those who fund them, and are the vehicle for ensuring that all the patients within their population area have equal access to the highest quality of cancer services available.

The Expert Advisory Group on Cancer was set up in 1993 and one of its first publications was the Policy Framework for Commissioning Cancer Services (Calman Hine 1995).  The framework introduced the need to develop Cancer Networks, reaching from Primary Care through Cancer Units and Cancer Centres, to monitor the effectivensss of the changes resulting from the recommendations in improving patient care.

In September 2000 the NHS Cancer Plan was published and within the plan the Cancer Network responsibilities were identified.  The Manual of Cancer Services Standards, published in April 2001, outlined the structure of the Networks.

Since its formation in 2001 a number of major policy initiatives have been launched which further define the work that Cancer Networks engage in:

• The Cancer Reform Strategy builds on the work of the NHS Cancer Plan into the future
• The North West Cancer Plan provides a specific response to the Cancer Reform Strategy and outlines work that will be undertaken in the North West
• The Improving Outcomes: A Strategy for Cancer released in January 2011

In October 2003 the Department of Health published a report highlighting the progress made in implementing the NHS Cancer Plan.  The full report is available here.