The European Oncopedia is a European School of Oncology project to document the history of Europe’s contributions to improving cancer care. It aims to give insights into how those contributions came about, and what difference they made to patients, by hearing where possible, directly from the people who were involved.
In part this is an exercise in giving credit where credit is due. It is also an exercise in showing the anatomy of medical innovation: the knowledge that we take for granted today was gained by people who, through both luck and good judgement, asked the right questions in the right way, and kept asking until they found answers
The coverage is restricted to contributions that made a major difference to patient survival or quality of life. This includes contributions to epidemiologic and clinical trial methodology that have made possible important progress made through a series of incremental improvements that are not themselves recorded here.
The European School of Oncology chose to focus the oncopedia on European contributions, because this is our core community and we want to tell our own story. However, we are also keen to acknowledge instances where the contributions covered include important input from the US or elsewhere.
A living document
Writing about the history of innovations is fraught with pitfalls. The writers and editorial panel have done their best to be accurate, and use fair judgement in what should or should not be included. We encourage readers to take a critical approach to our coverage, and to use the gmaggini@eso.net to alert us to possible inaccuracies or important omissions.
The Editorial Committee
Chair: Silvio Monfardini
Co-chairs: Alberto Costa and Nicholas Pavlidis
Editorial Director: Bernardino Fantini
Editorial Committee: Alfredo Addeo, Adriana Albini, Riccardo Audisio, Mariano Barbacid, Alessandro Blasimme, Giovanni Boniolo, Bettina Borisch, Alberto Cambrosio, Steven Pavletic, Fedro Peccatori, Philip Poortmans, Paolo Vineis and Theo Wagener
Editorial Coordinator: Anna Wagstaff
Editorial Secretary: Gabriele Maggini