Cancer Research in Switzerland - Krebsliga Schweiz

Clinical research
Challenges for clinical cancer research in Switzerland
The aim of patient-centred clinical cancer research is
to develop new cancer therapies and to optimize
existing tumour therapies so as to improve the prognosis
and tolerability of treatment in patients with
cancer. Typical research questions are, for example:
Will a combination of different chemotherapy drugs
produce better results? Will this cause more side effects?
What is the optimal combination of the three
types of treatment – chemotherapy, radiation therapy,
and surgery – for certain types of cancer and
patient groups? As chemotherapy is often very expensive,
an increasing number of investigations are
also examining the cost and benefits of treatments.
For patients with cancer, clinical cancer research has
two benefits: For one, participation in clinical trials
gives the patient early access to new treatments. For
another, treatment quality is the highest at institutions
that conduct clinical studies, as a recent study
on breast cancer treatment in Switzerland showed
[1].
Since also medium-sized and large hospitals are fre-
quently not able to conduct a research project by
themselves, clinical cancer research in Switzerland
depends upon good networking of the research
groups and centres. For many years now, this task
has been taken on by the Swiss Group for Clinical
Cancer Research (SAKK) for adults and by the Swiss
Paediatric Oncology Group (SPOG) for children. The
activities of the two non-profit organizations are
funded for the most part by research grants from the
Swiss government (State Secretariat for Education
Prof. Beat Thürlimann, MD
Head of the Breast Centre at the Cantonal Hospital of St Gallen and president of the Swiss Group
for Clinical Cancer Research (SAKK)
Arnoud Templeton, MD
Senior physician at the Cantonal Hospital of St Gallen and medical advisor of the Swiss Group
for Clinical Cancer Research (SAKK)
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