In this interview, we meet Pediatric Oncologist Helena van der Pal from PanCare.
Please introduce yourself and tell us why you joined PanCareSurPass?
My name is Helena van der Pal. I am the past Chair of the Board of the PanCare network. I am one of the founding members of the PanCare Society and a Board Member since 2011. I am a medical oncologist and have led the Outpatient Clinic for adult survivors of childhood cancer in the Emma Children’s Hospital/Academic Medical Centre in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, since 1997, including delivering care for 2,400 childhood cancer survivors. Since 2016, I am a senior staff member of the LATER Expertise Center for adult survivors of childhood cancer in the Princess Maxima Center for paediatric oncology in Utrecht, the Netherlands. I have a PhD in late effects after treatment for childhood cancer and have participated in the Dutch Childhood Oncology Group Late Effects Taskforce from its inception. I am also WP leader for PanCare for our sister project: PanCareFollowUp.
For me, PanCareSurPass represents another step towards PanCare’s ultimate goal: to achieve excellent survivorship care in Europe
You lead WP6 – tell us about it!
WP6 is about communicating and disseminating the project to our key stakeholders – survivors and their families, healthcare professionals and more
Why do you think PanCareSurPass is an important project?
I work in the Netherlands, where we have excellent survivorship care, but not all countries in Europe have these clinics. In our sister project PanCareFollowUp we aim to spread survivorship care throughout Europe. In addition to this in PanCareSurPass we will develop a digital version of the PanCare Survivorship Passport (SurPass). With SurPass both survivors and health care professionals have access to all information that is needed to deliver good care including a treatment summary and individualized recommendations for follow-up. It will also empower survivors to be an active participant in their own care.
I am very committed to improve care and quality of life of survivors in Europe.
What makes this project unique for you?
It‘s bringing professionals, researchers and survivors together, to improve survivorship care in Europe. So we can reach the ultimate goal of PanCare and that‘s to ensure equal access of care and quality of life for survivors of childhood cancer.
What do you hope this project will achieve?
I hope PanCareSurPass will facilitate the process of delivering long term survivorship care to every childhood cancer survivor in Europe.
What’s the biggest challenge in your WP?
In WP6, the biggest challenge is communication, finding the right message and finding the right medium to do so.
What’s the most fun thing in your WP?
The most fun is working together with all different people in this consortium. And for WP6 we will finally be able to show our promotional material in real life and not online!
What’s the most important benefit of your WP for survivors?
For WP6, the online information, social media content and the future website.
What else do we need to know about your WP or is there anything else you want to share?
Please join PanCare, if you think that survivorship care is important!! 😉
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 899999. The material presented and views expressed here are the responsibilities of the author(s) only. The EU Commission takes no responsibility for any use made of the information set out.