Ethics of personalised medicine to treat refactory childhood cancer

Project Details

Many rare and relapsed childhood cancers are difficult to cure. A new treatment approach called ‘personalised’ medicine involves whole genome sequencing with the aim of identifying specific drugs to target the tumour. This is an exciting new field but there are many complex issues. In particular there are ethical questions about which patients should be offered genomic sequencing, who should pay for this and for potentially expensive experimental drugs, and how risks should be managed. This study will identify preferences of families and healthcare professionals, develop an ethical framework to help decision-making and develop much-needed informational and educational resources