About PRC

The PRC coordinates groups and individual researchers across Europe along with researchers in North America and Australia, and consists of 25 core collaborating centres.

PRC is affiliated at Department of Oncology, Oslo University Hospital and Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Oslo. It was established in 2009 at Trondheim University Hospital and The Norwegian University of Science and Technology NTNU with recommendations and support from the European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC). These are still major collaborators with and contributors to PRC.

PRC performs national and international collaborative studies and conduct clinical research by use of different methodologies of clinical cancer research: prospective intervention studies, assessment and classification, implementation research and translational research. The clinical studies in the coming five-year period will focus on host-related factors in cancer patients. Further, PRC will systemize new and existing knowledge into evidence-based guidelines. Networking, dissemination, education and implementation is emphasized in collaboration with Norwegian Cancer Society.

PRC’s overall objective is to assure that patients with cancer receive best

evidence-based patient-centred care alongside with the best tumour-directed treatment. To achieve this goal, PRC’s tasks in the forthcoming years cover the whole chain from doing clinical studies to gain new knowledge, systemizing existing knowledge into guidelines and implementing the knowledge into practice by care pathways. A major objective for the PRC in the period 2020-2025 is to focus our research and dissemination activities on patient-centred care. In order to improve clinical practice, existing and new research findings must be implemented. Education also plays an important role in this context. PRC performs research, education and public health care development in patient cohorts receiving curative, life-prolonging or symptom-relieving treatments nationally and internationally.

The main sources of funding of PRC are The Norwegian Cancer Society, Oslo University Hospital, The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) and Trondheim University Hospital. Additional support has been awarded by main collaborating centres: Istituto Tumori in Milan, University of Edinburgh, University of Leeds, Princess Margareth Hospital in Toronto, Telemark Hospital, Ghent University and Rigshospitalet in Cobenhagen.

Pain and Palliation Research Group

When the PRC was established, it's members originated from the Pain and Palliation Research Group that was led by professor Stein Kaasa.

The Pain and Palliation Research Group at the Faculty of Medicine, NTNU, was established in 2001 and is a multidisciplinary research collaboration aiming at improving cancer care through basic-, clinical-, and translational research. The group today consists of 21 professors/ass.professors, seven post. docs/researchers, and over 30 PhD-, medical- and master students. The group has primarily focused on symptom management and the basic biological understanding of the most prevalent symptoms in patients with advanced cancer – pain, cachexia and depression. The Pain and Palliation Research Group has coordinated a number of large research initiatives, such as the EU-funded European Palliative Care Research Collaborative (EPCRC), the European Pharmacogenetic Opioid Study (EPOS), and the FUGE 2 funded "Translational Research in Lung Cancer and Palliative Care – from genomics to symptom control (TLCPC). The group is one of the few clinical groups in Norway that was evaluated to be of excellent quality at the Research Council evaluation in 2004, and is one of the prioritized groups at the Faculty of Medicine, NTNU. In 2009, professor Stein Kaasa was asked by the European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC) Board to establish a European Palliative Care Research Centre (PRC).

About PRC

Research strategy

Aims

Funding

Background

Pain and Palliation Research Group