The past year has been taken up working in collaboration with Zest Health Strategies on two projects for Cancer Australia.
I was employed as a freelance writer to assist in the research and writing of two literature reviews looking at aspects of cancer service provision in Australia.
In 2011, Cancer Australia commissioned ZEST Health Strategies (who in turn employed me as a freelance writer) to conduct a literature review to identify new evidence relevant to Australian cancer networks and to summarise the relevance of this evidence for cancer service delivery in Australia.
We identified a number of success factors for effective networks that may be valuable for future planning of the Mentoring Regional Cancer Services Initiative and more broadly for the development of cancer networks in Australia.
As a result of this literature review I have prepared a first author paper for publication summarising the outcomes of the review.
The second literature review forms part of the Models of Care for Lung Cancer in Australia, which is part of Cancer Australia’s National Lung Cancer Initiative. The project’s overall aim is to define a best practice model of care to improve outcomes for people diagnosed with lung cancer in Australia.
This literature review aimed to:
• summarise patterns of lung cancer care in order to define gaps and variations in the treatment and management of lung cancer in Australia
• identify, collate and review current national and international evidence on best practice models of care for the management of people diagnosed with lung cancer, including clinical and supportive care
• identify evidence-based tools and resources used to support service providers to provide best-practice lung cancer care.
This review is currently ongoing.
