Abstract
Quality assurance (QA) programmes are one of the mainstays of clinical research and
constitute the pillars on which European Organisation for Research Treatment of Cancer
(EORTC) delivers multidisciplinary therapeutic progress. Changing practice treatments
require solid evidence-based data, which can only be achieved if integral QA is part
of the infrastructure sustaining research projects. Cancer treatment is a multimodality
approach, which is often applied either in sequence and/or in combination. Each modality
plays a key role in cancer control. The modalities by which QA is applied varies substantially
within and across the disciplines. In addition, translational and diagnostic disciplines
take an increasing role in the era of precision medicine. Building on the structuring
effect of clinical research with fully integrated multidisciplinary QA programmes
associated with the solutions addressing the chain of custody for biological material
and data integrity as well as compliance ensure at the same time validity of clinical
research output but also have a training effect on health care providers, who are
more likely to apply such principles as routine. The principles of QA are therefore
critical to be embedded in multidisciplinary infrastructure to guarantee therapeutic
progress. These principles also provide the basis for the functioning of multidisciplinary
tumour board. However, technical, operational and economic challenges which go with
the implementation of such programmes require optimal know-how and the coordination
of the multiple expertise and such efforts are best achieved through centralised infrastructure.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: September 28, 2017
Accepted:
July 25,
2017
Received:
July 20,
2017
Identification
Copyright
© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
