Policy brief of the Belgian Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan mirror group: children, adolescents and young adults with cancer

Abstract

Children and Adolescents and Young Adults with cancer represent a young population with specific needs, which need to be addressed in a patient- and cancer-driven way. There is an urgent need to support and extend the ongoing initiatives in Belgium. First, multidisciplinary care programmes dedicated to children need to be reviewed, and those for Adolescents and Young Adults need to be developed with close collaboration between paediatric and adult oncology and haematology teams. This needs to be done considering the entire patient journey; from cancer prevention, diagnosis, treatment, rehabilitation, follow-up of late effects, transition pathways between paediatric and adult wards, and palliative care. Second, national haemato/oncology precision programmes adapted to this young population with rare cancers, including infrastructure to manage cancer gene predisposition in CAYAs with cancers and their relatives, needs to be developed. This multi-level plan aims to ensure improved outcome with high quality of care for the young population with cancer in Belgium in line with Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan initiatives.