Clinical research by Comprehensive Cancer Infrastructures for the benefit of patients with common cancers

Lung, bowel, breast and prostate cancer incidence, mortality and prevalence across EU Member States and Associated Countries are increasing while showing substantial variation, with Central and Eastern European communities, regions and countries particularly affected[[Cancer inequalities registry: https://cancer-inequalities.jrc.ec.europa.eu/]]. At the same time, the level of development of comprehensive cancer infrastructures continues to vary considerably across EU Member States and Associated Countries, contributing to inequalities, in particular in terms of clinical research capacity as well as quality of and access to innovative diagnostic and therapeutic interventions.

Applicants should address all of the following:

• Comprehensive cancer infrastructures across the EU Member States and Associated Countries come together to conduct clinical research on lung, bowel, breast or prostate cancer focusing on at least one of the following areas:
  • Innovative diagnostics;
  • Radiotherapy, surgery, chemotherapy;
  • Therapeutic cancer vaccines for the treatment of cancer patients with early-stage, advanced, metastatic or minimal residual disease (e.g. after debulking by surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy, or immunotherapy);
  • Implementation of appropriate clinical practice guidelines for diagnosis and treatment in countries without or with limited Comprehensive Cancer Infrastructures;
• Comprehensive cancer infrastructures should extensively pilot and upscale innovative diagnostic or treatment programmes in at least four different EU Member States or Associated Countries. One of the four targeted EU Member States should represent a country without or with a less developed comprehensive cancer infrastructure.
• To ensure that together they address - and whenever feasible - overcome challenges because of the national, regional, or local research and healthcare context (e.g. those faced by small(er) EU Member States, or due to a large rural population, or particular cancer burden, socio-economic or environmental situation, or limited clinical research capacity[[research laboratories, diagnostics and clinical trial infrastructures]]), when designing and conducting innovative clinical research programmes with added value for the timely diagnosis and treatment of patients with lung, bowel, breast or prostate cancer;
• Identify additional resources through the European Research Development Fund (ERDF), the Technical Support Instrument[[Technical Support Instrument (TSI), DG REFORM]], the Resilience and Recovery Facility (RRF), philanthropy, the European Investment Bank Group (EIB[[Homepage | European Investment Bank]], EIF[[eif.org/index.htm]]) or any other initiative;
• Innovative clinical research programmes should be defined together with patients and their caregivers/families using participative research models and adapted to the needs of the target population and the specificities of healthcare provision at local, regional, or national level, duly reflecting the (cultural) diversity and available resources across EU Member States and Associated Countries;
• Data should be disaggregated by sex, gender, age and other relevant variables, such as by measures of socio-economic status or ethnicity;
• All datasets produced should be described with metadata records in the EU dataset catalogue of the European Health Data Space, while all tools and models should take advantage of current European research infrastructures, should follow the principles of open science and made available through the future UNCAN.eu platform;
• Applicants should include an appropriate mix of stakeholders from various disciplines and sectors[[such as physicians, academia, patients and their caregivers, patient representatives, engineers, behavioural scientists, SMEs, business networks, insurance companies, charities and foundations, research organisations, civil society.]] and provide details of the clinical study(ies) in the dedicated annex using the template provided in the submission system.

Successful proposals will be asked to join the 'Diagnosis and treatment” cluster[[In order to address the objectives of the EU Cancer Mission, participants will collaborate in project clusters to leverage EU-funding, increase networking across sectors and disciplines, and establish a portfolio of EU Cancer Mission R&I and policy actions.]] for the EU Cancer Mission and should include a budget for networking, attendance at meetings, and joint activities[[Examples of those activities are research or research capacity, organising joint workshops, establishing best practices, joint communication or citizen engagement activities with projects funded under other clusters and pillars of Horizon Europe, or other EU programmes, as appropriate. Proposals are not required to include details of these activities, as they will be defined during the grant agreement preparation and during the life of the project.]]. The Commission will facilitate coordination of these activities.

The successful proposals are expected to build on relevant networks launched under the Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan that could facilitate cross-border clinical trials[[Such as the EU Network of comprehensive cancer centres EUNetCCC]], resources made available by relevant ESFRI Research Infrastructures[[Such as BBMRI, EATRIS, ELIXIR, ECRIN.]], and the Knowledge Centre on Cancer (KCC) to foster EU alignment and coordination[[Hosted by the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC). Especially through the ’European Guidelines and Quality Assurance Schemes for Breast, Colorectal and Cervical Cancer Screening and Diagnosis‘, and the ’European Cancer Information System (ECIS)’ and the ’European Cancer Inequalities Registry (ECIR), see https://knowledge4policy.ec.europa.eu/cancer_en.]].(opens in new window)