Wielkopolskie Centrum Onkologii

The Great Poland Cancer Centre is the only cancer centre in the region of Great Poland that uses full combined cancer treatment: surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy.

Annually over 18 000 patients are hospitalized, and 5 600 surgical procedures as well as 8000 ambulatory procedures are carried out. Radiation treatment is applied over 7000 times a year.

In Poland over 12 000 people per year develop neoplastic diseases. In our country it is possible to cure only 30% of them, compared to over 50% in the USA. Radiotherapy can be applied in 50% of cases. This means that in the region of Great Poland radiotherapy is required by 6000 patients per year. To do that we need about 12 megavoltage machines (accelerators and cobalt). Currently there are only 8 machines of this type in Great Poland.

Radiotherapy is one of the basic and widely used combined cancer treatment methods (with surgery and chemotherapy). There are about 80 megavoltage machines in Poland, which is only 50% of the number needed. There are 6 megavoltage machines in the Great Poland Cancer Centre. All over the world oncology is supported by the government, irrespective of the system. Investment outlays for oncological treatment in Poland are insufficient and getting smaller every year.

The Great Poland Cancer Centre despite a difficult market situation does not give up and sets itself as its main aim the improvement of medical services quality. High quality gives confidence in treatment and safety of implemented therapy and our working conditions.

Taking into consideration our patients' well-being and the quality of the services the Centre uses financial support from structural funds of the European Union. Since 2004 the EU project has been implemented. The aim of this project is to improve standards and accessibility of specialist treatment, including radiotherapy. Within the project the Radiotherapy Clinic, Radiotherapy Department and Computer Tomography will be enlarged and modernized. The infrastructure of the Great Poland Cancer Centre have been improve, the Mould Room have been modernized and a Tomotherapy accelerator and PET-CT have been bought.

Integrated Management System in conformity with ISO 9001:2000 (in imaging diagnostics and nuclear medicine), ISO 14001:2004 and PN-N 18001:2004 is proof of the hospital's high quality. The Great Poland Cancer Centre implements international quality standards: ISO norm 9001:2000 - "Quality management systems - requirements" - and in the case of environmental management and occupational health and safety the ISO norm 14001:2004 "Environmental management systems - requirements and guidelines" and PN-N norm 18001:2004 "Safety management system and occupational health - requirements".

In June 2006 there took place an audit which confirmed conformity of the system with the assumed standards, and the certificating auditors from Lloyd's Register Quality Assurance gave their recommendation for the certificate.

Prof. UM Dr Hab. Julian Malicki
Director of the Great Poland Cancer Centre