Cancer trials on the web

Many rsearch trials are currently underway

Information about clinical trials of new cancer treatments is to be made available directly to the public for the first time.

The information will be contained on a website launched on Tuesday by the Cancer Research Campaign (CRC).

The CancerHelp UK website is designed to give people with cancer more power to make choices about their own treatment.

Click here to see the CancerHelp UK website

Patients will be able to check whether they are eligible for a particular trial, print off the details and then discuss with their doctor whether they could be put on it.

Trials are important because they can give patients the chance of receiving the latest cutting edge treatment for a particular disease.

For example, one underway in London, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Bristol, Newcastle and Ayr in Scotland, features the drug Taxotere, made by Aventis Pharma.

Currently being used to treat women with breast and lung cancer, the drug is now being tested on prostate cancer patients.

We want to change this attitude and give patients far more control of their own destiny

Professor Gordon McVie, Cancer Research Campaign

The website is being launched by leading libel lawyer Sir George Carman QC, who has prostate cancer.

He said: "Its important for patients to know what studies and treatments are available to them. I believe it is vital in the fight against the disease.

"Until now the only way most British cancer patients would know about the trials that might be suitable for them was if their doctor was up to speed on the latest developments."

US lead

Professor Gordon McVie, CRC director general said information on trials was already readily available in the US.

"Patients demand to be put on trials because it ensures they get the very best available treatment.

George Carman will launch the website

"But in the UK patients have not been given first hand information about trials up till now and the majority of people don't know that they are a good thing.

"We want to change this attitude and give patients far more control of their own destiny. That's what this website is all about."

The CancerHelp UK website was set four years ago to give detailed advice and information to cancer patients.

Another major feature of the site is useful questions which patients can ask their doctors when faced with a diagnosis of cancer.

One of the founders, Dr Nick James at the University of Birmingham explains: "These questions include things like: what experience has the specialist got in treating my sort of cancer; what if I donıt agree with whatıs being proposed; is this my only option?

"From my experience, people are often so staggered by a cancer diagnosis that any of the questions they wanted to ask go out the window.

"We want this site to give them pointers on issues they might like to raise so that it can be another way of empowering them."