NHS England’s public consultation on the new Principal Treatment Centre
In November 2022, Evelina London Children’s Hospital submitted a proposal to become the new Principal Treatment Centre (PTC) for south London and most of south east England. To make sure that everyone who wants to can share their views for the new centre, NHS England – London is reaching out to children, teenagers, families, staff, communities and other stakeholders from across the region and beyond, to ask them to get involved.
Choosing Evelina London is a once in a generation opportunity to bring together the leading children’s cancer experts with our existing world-class specialist paediatric team to create the comprehensive children’s hospital our region needs and deserves.
Watch a film about our children's cancer proposal
I'm Sara Hanna, and I'm medical director of Evelina London. At Evelina London, we have been passionate about providing the best possible care to children and their families for more than 150 years.
We can do this because of our 4,000 dedicated and compassionate staff spanning more than 30 specialist areas. No other children's hospital in the region offers that breadth and scale of expertise dedicated to children, and that's why we believe we are uniquely placed to deliver care to those children with cancer who require the most complex treatment.
We have 50 specialist children's surgeons operating within 10 theatres, more children in research studies than any hospital in London, and our exceptional facilities mean our teams can extend pioneering research of new cancer therapies to children.
We have the region's only kidney and heart services undertaking the most complex operations and 24/7 access to child-friendly, state-of-the-art imaging facilities, some of which are not found elsewhere in the UK.
Our critical care transport service safely moves the sickest children from their local hospitals for intensive care, including children with cancer. Our doctors and nurses provide advice, education, and training to every hospital in the region so treatment can start even before our teams arrive.
The design of the hospital was inspired by children and families, bright and friendly spaces, with plenty of places to play. We have overnight accommodation for 60 families in our Ronald McDonald House.
We will design the cancer facility, including dedicated parking and a transport service, together with families and staff. Our Trust has a long history of cancer services at Guy's Hospital, already treating teenagers and young adults.
We believe we will provide the best care for children and young people with cancer and the highly skilled staff that support them.
Why Evelina London
We believe we are uniquely placed to provide the best care, research and support to children and young people with cancer, and their families.
World-class
Evelina London is the only option that will mean the new children’s cancer centre is based at a dedicated children’s hospital. This will align our region with the rest of the country and international best practice, ensuring children and their families have access to the best possible clinical expertise.
Clinical research
We can immediately begin new children’s cancer clinical research studies and offer the latest immune therapies like CAR-T, both essential for the future of children’s cancer care. We have two dedicated children’s research wards and a specialist children’s research team already working on more than 200 children’s research studies with academic partners worldwide.
Family support
We understand how tough it is to be the family member of a seriously unwell child.
To support families, we will offer:
- free, dedicated parking for the new children’s cancer centre
- support with the cost of travel
- free overnight accommodation, including 60 rooms in our dedicated Ronald McDonald House.
Connected
Moving the children's cancer centre will reduce the need to move seriously ill children needing critical care. Our teams here at Evelina London already share paediatric clinicians and research projects with the specialist hospitals that will support the new children’s cancer centre.
Evelina London Children’s Hospital is an award-winning, outstanding rated hospital that has been co-designed by children and families to be bright, friendly and offer plenty of places to play.
Thank you for taking the time to learn more about our wonderful children’s hospital and our vision for the future of children’s cancer care in south London, Kent, Surrey, and Sussex.
NHS England have now launched the public consultation on two options – Evelina London Children’s Hospital and St George’s University Hospital.
Evelina London is named as NHS England’s preferred option at this stage in the process and they are keen to hear your views.
This is in line with the legal duties of the NHS to involve the public and consider all viable options fairly.
The NHS England public consultation is available on the NHS England website where you can find out more information and share your views.
NHS England – London will make its final decision on the location of the new centre after hearing the views that come forward during the public consultation and taking account of all other relevant factors.
No decision will be made until the public consultation has concluded, feedback has been reviewed and all relevant information taken into consideration. Services are not expected to move before 2026.
Cancer care for patients aged 16 and above will continue to be delivered at The Royal Marsden, which is a leading centre of excellence for cancer care providing the highest quality of safe and specialist care including the latest cancer research.
Principal treatment centres provide diagnosis, treatments, and coordination of highly specialised care for children aged 15 and under with cancer. There are 13 of them in England.
On 21 June 2023, NHS England published an update on proposed new locations for children’s cancer centre for south London and most of south east England. It sets out how children’s cancer services should be organised and delivered across the country in the future. Among other things, it requires all children’s cancer principal treatment centres to be on the same site as a paediatric intensive care unit (PICU) and other specialised children’s services such as paediatric surgery relevant to children’s cancer care.
This is because children being treated for cancer are sometimes at risk of needing to be transferred urgently to an intensive care unit. With future, cutting-edge treatments being developed for children with cancer, intensive care and other specialised children’s services will increasingly be required to be on-site.
Currently, the children’s cancer principal treatment centre covering the catchment area of south London, Kent, Medway, most of Surrey, East Sussex, Brighton and Hove is jointly provided by The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust and St George’s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. The Royal Marsden does not have a paediatric intensive care unit on-site, which means that some children are currently safely transferred between the site and St George’s Hospital every year.
To ensure that children with cancer continue to get world-leading care in London as new innovative forms of specialist treatment are increasingly used, these arrangements need to change.
Evelina London Children’s Hospital, which is part of Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, and St George’s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust both submitted proposals to become the new children's cancer primary treatment centre, providing all the required services on one site.
Over 30 experts, including clinical advisers, parents, charities, nurses and research staff, were involved in evaluating the proposals as part of an options-appraisal process designed by NHS England – London and shaped by a range of stakeholders. Four panels of about 10 people each looked at different aspects of the proposals to understand:
- how the proposals would deliver the service in the future, compared to what happens currently
- what each would mean for patients, families and staff delivering clinical care
- how the proposals would deliver the clinical aspects of care
- how the proposals would support research that underpins future improvement
Based on the evidence provided by the evaluation in which Evelina London scored higher, Evelina London is the preferred option at this stage in the process. The outcome from this options appraisal process will form one part of the information shared for the public consultation and will be a factor in NHS England – London’s final decision on the location of the new children’s cancer principal treatment centre. However, it is important that people have an opportunity to consider all the information shared for public consultation when providing their views.
For more information on the NHS England – London public consultation process and to share your views, visit the NHS England website.
If you would like to contact the team at Evelina London regarding our proposal for the children’s cancer principal treatment centre, please email ELCHEngagement@gstt.nhs.uk.
If you would like to contact the team at NHS England who are running this project, please email england.ptcchildrenscancer@nhs.net.