Barts Cancer Centre | About us
About us
One of the most advanced cancer centres in Europe
At Barts Cancer Centre, we offer the very latest in cancer care in world-class facilities, in a safe, welcoming and healing sanctuary in the heart of the City of London.
Pioneering cancer research combines with leading-edge treatment and technologies to ensure our patients are some of the first to benefit from new therapies. Our leading specialists are passionate about caring for patients and together with a formidable array of imaging, radiotherapy and radiosurgery technology this makes our centre an NHS hospital like no other. If I were a patient, this is where I would want to be treated.
Please use the pages in this website to find out more about us.
Professor Nick Lemoine
Director of Barts Cancer Centre and The Institute of Cancer
Barts is Britain’s oldest hospital and was founded in 1123. The hospital has always been at the forefront of medical discovery and innovation, from the circulation of the blood by founder of modern medicine, William Harvey in the 17th century, to the use of surgery and radiotherapy to treat cancer in the 19th and 20th centuries. This pioneering tradition continues today with groundbreaking research and leading edge cancer diagnostics, therapies and facilities.
The cancer centre, a breathtakingly beautiful building in the heart of the city of London, has been carefully designed to improve the patients’ experience.
The brand new centre opened to patients in March 2010 and is the first phase of a major redevelopment of Barts and The Royal London hospitals. For more information about our new hospitals please visit the dedicated section on Barts and The London website.
A national referral centre for all forms of cancer
Our specialists care for adult patients with all forms of malignant disease, providing cancer services to a catchment of more than one and a half million people in east London and the City. And as a national referral centre, we care for patients from all around the country. We treat an average of 3,100 new cancer patients each year.
As well as offering the latest minimally invasive surgical procedures, cancer drugs, stem cell and gene therapies, the centre has a formidable array of state-of-the art imaging, radiotherapy and radiosurgery technology capable of targeting tumours with pinpoint accuracy to minimise damage to healthy tissue.
Using research to develop cutting-edge treatments
We are continually pushing the boundaries to develop new and successful treatments and many of our team of specialists also work as scientists to research and investigate innovative treatments and technologies. Working closely with the Barts Cancer Centre Institute (www.bci.qmul.ac.uk) at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry, our team of clinicians and scientists are at the forefront of cancer research – investigating new therapies and novel approaches for the diagnosis, and treatment of cancer.
At our experimental cancer medicine centre, we specialise in ‘translational oncology,’ that aims to make the research undertaken in the laboratory translate into clinical trials and the development of novel treatments for patients. Our clinical trials are available for selected patients who are no longer responding to existing drug therapies, and instead can have access to new medicines or combinations of new medicines – thereby offering these patients new hope.
State-of-the-art blood cancer service
The Bodley Scott haemato-oncology unit provides state-of-the-art diagnostic facilities and treatment for all forms of blood cancer (leukaemia, lymphoma, and myeloma). Our team of internationally recognised experts has been instrumental in the design and use of novel treatment approaches, such as bone marrow transplantation, many of which are now used routinely. We have an extensive portfolio of clinical trials and laboratory research programmes for a range of conditions – please click here for further information.
Treatment of common and rare cancers
There are highly specialised teams for each of the common cancers (lung, breast stomach and bowel, kidney, prostate, bladder, ovarian, endometrial, and cervical) as well as some of the more rare forms such as mesothelioma, testis, and melanoma. We specialise in the use of the most effective and up-to-date treatments combining where necessary surgery with chemotherapy, radiotherapy, hormone treatment, and new drugs for cancer.
Leading radiotherapy service
Our comprehensive radiotherapy service offers state-of-the-art treatments for patients with cancer. We have five modern linear accelerators (linacs), which means that treatment continues daily without interruption. In addition, we are one of only a few hospitals in the UK to offer intensity modulated therapy, which can mould the radiation dose even more closely to the tumour to avoid neighbouring sensitive healthy regions. The most exciting recent addition to our facilities is the Cyberknife, a ground-breaking radiosurgery system that uses advanced robotics to treat tumours anywhere in the body. The Cyberknife is able to target individual tumours with greater precision and less damage to surrounding healthy tissue than any other form of radiotherapy, and patients are typically treated in just one to five sessions. For more information, please click here.
Seamless service
We ensure that you and your carers are kept fully informed at each stage of your care. And if you’d like more information about your condition, our cancer information centre provides a confidential, drop-in service for anyone affected by cancer. Our specialist staff are on hand to provide literature on all aspects of living with cancer and an opportunity to discuss treatments, side effects and other cancer related issues in a private, comfortable room.
Critical to the quality of our service is teamwork; you will be treated by a team of clinical experts – radiologists, pathologists, surgeons, medical and clinical oncologists, alongside high quality nursing care and therapeutic support. We work closely with our local healthcare partners including GPs, health and social workers and palliative care teams, ensuring that your care continues after you leave hospital.
Our Cancer Network
We are the specialist regional centre for cancer treatment in north east London and we belong to the North East London Cancer Network together with Homerton, Newham, Whipps Cross, King George Ilford, and Queens Hospitals. Barts Cancer Centre provides an outreach service to each of these hospitals, (and for some services to an extended network of other hospitals) meaning that our specialists can often treat patients at their local hospitals as well as on site at Barts, according to their individual requirements. With our colleagues at University College Partners, we are now developing London Cancer, the new Integreated Cancer System to deliver even better care to the 3.2 million people who live in central and east London.
