STRONG AYA kicks off in Amsterdam

December 20, 2022

STRONG AYA kicks off in Amsterdam

Funded by UKRI and EU HORIZON support, STRONG AYA joins fourteen European centres for care, research and advocacy to improve research and healthcare for adolescents and young adults (AYA) with cancer. The collaboration brings together medical oncologists, epidemiologists, healthcare researchers, data scientists, legal and policy experts, and patients to establish a core outcome set, to implement these outcomes across five European healthcare systems and to develop new models to support AYA care and treatment.

Adolescents and young adults (aged 18-39) living with cancer are a unique demographic that currently does not have dedicated age-specific care in cancer, in contrast to paediatric care. However this life phase is characterized by unique experiences and considerations such as fertility, romantic relationships, gender identity and sexuality development, financial independence, parenting young children, education and career establishment, all of which present distinct challenges for people with a cancer diagnosis. The project fundamentally seeks to establish a patient-centred European network of knowledge sharing to improve and establish dedicated age-specific treatment for YAYs living with cancer at an international level.

The STRONG AYA consortium is made up of :
Netherlands Cancer Institute, the Netherlands
Maastricht University, the Netherlands
Netherlands Comprehensive Cancer Organisation (IKNL), the Netherlands
FFUND BV, the Netherlands
European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) (Belgium)
European Cancer Organisation (E.C.O.), Belgium
Youth Cancer Europe, Romania
University of Southampton, United Kingdom
University of Leeds and Leeds Teaching Hospital, United Kingdom
University of Manchester and Christie NHS Foundation Trust, United Kingdom
Fondazione IRCCS InstitutoNazionale dei Tumori, , Italy
Centre de LutteContre le Cancer Leon Berard, France
Institut Gustave Roussy, France
NarodowyInstytutOnkologiiim. MariiSklodowskiej-Curie, Poland

STRONG AYA officially kicked off with a meeting of consortium members in Amsterdam on 12 October.