European Association For Palliative Care Announces The Foundation Of The European Palliative Care Research Center

Main Category: Palliative Care / Hospice Care
Article Date: 11 May 2009 - 2:00 PDT

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"In most European countries, we are trying to establish evidence based guidelines for patient care in all therapeutic areas. Palliative care is no exception to this, evidence is needed to improve palliative care across Europe", says Prof. Dr. Stein Kaasa, Chair of the EAPC Research Network (Trondheim, Norway), at the 11th Congress of the European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC), which brings together more than 3,000 experts from all over the world in Vienna from May 7 to 10. "To reach this goal, we need high quality research. One of the problems is that palliative research in Europe is not yet as high in quality and magnitude as we would like," says the expert.

Traditional obstacles to research

There are numerous reasons why research in the palliative area is not as developed as in other areas of medicine, says Prof. Kaasa. One of these is that palliative care traditionally developed mainly outside the university environment. "Due to difficult ethical questions involved in conducting studies with severely ill or dying patients, there is traditionally also a lot of skepticism in the palliative and hospice movement towards research," the expert says. In addition, palliative care has been allocated very few resources in many countries, and they were used for the development of palliative services rather than for research to gather evidence.

New initiatives encourage palliative research

However, through a range of activities, palliative research is rapidly gaining ground at the European level. "Now there are a lot of initiatives on the international level to set up collaborative research efforts aimed at high quality investigations," Prof. Kaasa points out.

An important contribution has been made to this development by the EAPC Research Network, which the Norwegian expert is chairing and which works intensively to establish networks and mobilize resources for research collaboration at the international level.

EU assistance for research into cachexia and pain measurement

These endeavors have been very successful. With the European Palliative Care Research Collaborative (EPCRC) it has been possible to establish the first major palliative care project within the European Commission's Framework Programmes, which were developed to support research. "Eleven participating centers in the UK, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Austria and Norway, coordinated by the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, are involved in this project," Prof. Kaasa reports. "The project received 2.8 million Euro in funding for a three year period."

Four main themes are the subject of this extensive research project, which is expected to run until November 2009: in one of them scientists want to identify genes and genetic changes which are responsible for the highly varied reactions of individual patients to opioid treatment, but also genetic changes that increase the risk of so-called cachexia. Cachexia is a set of syndromes marked primarily by fatigue, which is very common among palliative patients and is major burden for them. "Pain, depression and fatigue are clinical manifestations of advanced cancer affecting large patient groups," Prof. Kaasa says, underlying the relevance of the subject under research. "Even today, our understanding of these symptoms and conditions is insufficient."

Another particular project aims to improve the classification and assessment of pain, depression and cachexia by computer-assisted approaches. On the basis of such a standardized classification, it would then be possible to develop evidence based guidelines for assessment and treatment of pain, depression and cachexia in palliative care. The fourth and final aim is to ensure cooperation beyond the time frame of the projects given EU assistance - the intention is to develop a long lasting European collaborative effort in palliative cancer research.

European Palliative Care Research Center within reach

An additional goal of the international collaborative research endeavors is now within reach, which could also boost research initiatives at the institutional level. Recently the Norwegian Cancer Society has decided to contribute with a grant of 15 million Norwegian Kroner - that corresponds to 1.7 million euro - to the establishment of the European Palliative Care Research Center. The grant is for a period of five years. In addition, support has also been received through a grant from the Floriani Foundation in Milan, Italy, a grant from the Open Society Institute (USA), as well as from an unrestricted grant from Nycomed.

The Center will be hosted by the Palliative Care Program at Trondheim University Hospital as well as the Faculty of Medicine of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim. "This new center is not an independent research facility but a virtual structure, which should support and encourage research cooperation between universities and clinical centers across the whole of Europe," says Prof. Kaasa, explaining the concept. "The Center will establish formal collaboration with institutions and individuals across Europe and from other parts of the world, as well as with the European Association for Palliative Care Research Network and other palliative care research associations and collaboratives." The aim of the Centre, Prof. Kaasa emphasizes, "is to improve patient management through scientific evidence based guidelines and to bring evidence based knowledge into clinical practice."

"We are hoping for support from other European countries for the research institute," says Prof. Kaasa, outlining further steps.

European Association for Palliative Care

Source:
Dr. Birgit Kofler
B&K Medien- und Kommunikationsberatung GmbH