Description
The goal of the project is to mobilise citizens across Poland to get involved in monitoring several hundred cancer treatment facilities in the country. The goal will be accomplished by extending existing watchdog tools (portal ONKOMAPA.PL) and mobilisation and promotion campaigns. Today, the ONKOMAPA.PL portal supports the monitoring of only 40 largest general hospitals in Poland which offer cancer treatment. The project will help increase our capacity to scrutinise other types of facilities (radiotherapy, outpatient clinics, diagnostic centres and other), increase the number of facilities from 40 to several hundred and increase the public participation of 75,000 citizens and get them involved in the monitoring exercise. This proposed project is Alivia Foundations' response to identified social needs with respect to a community audit of public confidence cancer treatment facilities, access to accurate information about these facilities and removing existing inequalities in access to high quality cancer treatment opportunities.
Summary of project results
"When looking for the best treatment, cancer patients and their relatives often try to visit several medical centres and consult several doctors. But in choosing their doctor and the medical centre, they have limited opportunities to learn opinions from other patients and get to know which medical centres in their vicinity are better or worse evaluated. Patients and their families also have no opportunity to present their opinions on medical centres where they were treated. The aim of the project was to activate citizens throughout the country to monitor medical centres offering cancer treatment. The portal was visited by over 180 000 persons, over 3.5 thousand persons filled questionnaires evaluating medical centres. The portal Onkomapa was broadened to cover new types of cancer centres, so that cancer patients were given an opportunity to evaluate and learn about achievements of not only the biggest cancer treatment hospitals situated in big cities, but also smaller medical centres located in smaller, and often closer situated towns. As a result, patients are able to choose more wisely the place for medical checks and treatment, no matter what their place of residence and material status are. During the project the portal ONKOMAPA.PL was broadened by including new types of medical centres. The existing 40 big cancer medical centres were supplemented with radiotherapy centres, diagnostic centres and clinics, so the number of evaluated centres reached several hundreds. A conference was organised where medical centres and doctors with the best evaluations on the portal were singled out. The project benefited cancer patients, their families, and the doctors and medical centres offering cancer treatment. The project partner, the Foundation We Patients, prepared the questionnaires to evaluate new types of medical centres and organised the conference ending the project."
Summary of bilateral results