“Summary”

Specialist cancer nurses all over Europe are seeing their roles expand, sometimes to cover
areas that were formerly the responsibility of doctors. A position paper from ECCO, the European
Cancer Organization, suggests that this trend should go further, as a way of addressing the shortage
of doctors in the context of increasing demand for cancer services. “The clinical nurse specialist role
has evolved for multiple reasons – not just to meet patient needs and expectations but also to meet
service needs and fill the junior doctor deficit. When I think about what the junior doctors used to do
years ago, we do most of it now. Patient follow-up, discharge planning, all of those sorts of things.
The doctors used to arrange the patient’s admission, but now we do all of it.

Realizing the full potential of nurses to do what they do best needs to start with describing the wide
range of contributions to care they are already making. Achieving such a description is the goal of an
ambitious research project currently in progress. RECaN (Recognising European Cancer Nursing)
has been gathering evidence on what cancer nurses are contributing to patient outcomes.

Phase 1 of the RECaN project involved combing through the existing literature on trials of
interventions delivered by cancer nurses. The study, published in 2018, is the first systematic review
to focus on defining the impact of cancer nursing on patients’ experiences and outcomes across the
spectrum of cancer (Int J Nurs Studies 2018, 86:36–43).

Phase 2 of the RECaN project compared aspects of cancer nursing across four European countries,
with a particular focus on safety, working conditions, recognition and management. The countries
were Estonia and Germany, where the nursing role is less developed, and the Netherlands and the
UK, where it is more advanced.

Phase 3 of the RECaN project, which is looking at how to better promote cancer nursing as a
recognised speciality across different political or health contexts within Europe. Key to this advocacy
will be the evidence generated by the RECaN literature review and the case studies comparing
cancer nursing in the UK, Netherlands, Germany and Estonia.
ARTICLE REVIEW

“Better outcomes, better experiences: why cancer nursing is a job for

specialists”

The nurses have vital roles in health care as they are the caregiver for patients
and helps to manage physical needs, prevent illness, and help treat health conditions.
To do this, they need to observe and monitor the patient, recording any relevant
information to aid in treatment decision-making. Throughout the treatment process, the
nurse follows the progress of the patient and acts accordingly with the patient’s best
interests in mind. Moreover, help doctors create a care plan, and carry out that care
plan with medication and treatment administration. Nurses use a variety of medical
equipment for both monitoring and performing treatments. They may also do
diagnostic tests, take vitals and interpret the results. Furthermore, patient education is
another important part of the job. Nurses help patients learn how to make healthy
choices. After a medical diagnosis, the nurse helps the patient and caregivers
understand the diagnosis and learn how to handle it. The care provided by a nurse
extends beyond the administration of medications and other therapies. They are
responsible for the holistic care of patients, which encompasses the psychosocial,
developmental, cultural, and spiritual needs of the individual.

According to the article I have read professional nurses in Europe, wanted to raise
awareness on cancer nursing to become a specialized profession and make a common
ground for a curriculum in order to deliver optimal care, the need to ensure healthcare
professions are given the opportunity required to develop specialized knowledge and expertise in
oncology. In addition, increased pace of research, sophisticated cancer treatments and the trend
toward personalized medicine are bringing a new urgency for healthcare professionals to gain
skills that are in tune with these innovations.

Recognising European Cancer Nursing (RECaN) is a major project led by the

European Oncology Nursing Society (EONS) and supported by the European CanCer
Organisation (ECCO).Through the RECaN project, EONS and ECCO would like to see
contemporary cancer nursing better recognized to ensure that: 1) Cancer nurses are core
members of the multi-professional team;2) Cancer nursing should be a recognized specialty
across Europe based on a mutually agreed educational curriculum;3) Education for
specialist cancer nurses should be made available and ;4) Enhanced free movement of
cancer nurses across Europe should be promoted and facilitated to help address rising
demand. This project is divided into three phases: Phase 1: a systematic review of the
impact of nursing on patient outcomes and experiences drawing on International evidence;
Phase 2: data gathering in four contrasting case study sites (countries) in Europe where
nursing is at different stages of development and; Phase 3: engaging with the onco-policy
community and sharing the findings from phases one and two; looking at how to promote
nursing better in different political or health contexts within Europe.

Furthermore, according to the article nurses were championed as the radar of what is
happening in oncology wards, as they link patients’ needs and feelings to the medical team.
Further examples showed that nurses are more likely to build trusted relations with patients who
confide in them, to advocate for patients’ issues in the medical team. In these relationships
patients know they are being heard.

The RECaN projects build on previous initiatives demonstrating the added value of
specialized and personalized cancer nursing interventions and can be considered in relation to
increased professional mobility, the increasing need for comparable educational curricula, and
career advancement for those wishing to specialize in cancer care within a multidisciplinary
setting. As the RECaN project is rising global demand of cancer and the need for well-educated
and motivated nurses to address the (often complex) needs of more and more patients. If it is not
recognizing the value of cancer nursing at the policy level (and also in terms of employment
practices and education opportunities) then it is a risk, simply not having the quality nurses
needed to meet the cancer burden.

The groundwork for establishing national cancer nurse courses and qualifications has
already been done by EONS. Its Cancer Nursing Education Framework identifies the fundamental
knowledge and skills required for a nurse working in cancer care, and can be used as guidance for
developing a national training program. Since the Framework was launched in 1991 as the Post-
Basic Curriculum in Cancer Nursing, it has been extensively revised multiple times to reflect the
expanding roles of nurses, along with other developments within cancer care

RECaN projects also receives opposition, Germany is an example of a country with strong
political antagonism to higher education for nurses. The Care Professions Reform Act
(Pflegeberufereformgesetz), which passed in 2018, originally represented a move away from
specialism, with plans to merge the three previously separate care qualifications (in nursing,
pediatric care and geriatric care). It caused controversy because of concerns that, if all nurses had
the same generalist training, they could move between roles more easily and that nurses in the
badly-paid field of geriatric care would switch to a different occupation.

When it’s normal for cancer nurses to have their specialism respected within multidisciplinary
teams, it’s hard for policy-makers to withhold that recognition, especially when doctors speak up as
part of the wider national conversation.

In this climate it is important to recognize the contribution that cancer nurses make and to
ensure that their potential is maximized in whatever health economy they are employed in.
Moreover, all national health systems need to ensure the provision of healthcare professions with
specialized knowledge to truly provide the best cancer care to patient