Blogs

Our oncology outreach team reflects on its first 18 months and the difference it is making to patients

We are Sasha Crilly, Gill Davison, and Claire Wilson, and we are the oncology outreach team. We provide SACT treatments to patients at the Northumbria Specialist Emergency Care Hospital (NSECH) in Cramlington.

SACT stands for Systemic Anti-Cancer Therapy. This covers all drug treatments used to fight cancer, such as chemotherapy and immunotherapy.

Usually, patients would have these treatments in one of our oncology day units. However, this is not always possible.

A patient may be too unwell to go somewhere else, for example if they are on our critical care or respiratory support units. Or they may require extra monitoring during treatment, for example, heart monitoring.

This means we do planned treatments for patients who require extra monitoring, but also unplanned urgent work when patients come into hospital with a new or worsening condition.

When we set up the service in September 2024, the objectives were to:

• Allow the sickest oncology and haematology patients to get treatments when they need it without the need for transfer to another hospital.
• Relieve pressure on colleagues in other services.
• Support the introduction of new treatment options.

The overall aim though was to improve patient experience. The evidence shows that we have done this, with 100% of patients asked satisfied with the quality of care we provided.

We have had comments from patients and their families describing us as ‘comprehensive and caring’, ‘first-class’, ‘absolutely amazing and very supportive’, and ‘very caring, efficient and knowledgeable’.

The data shows that there is a need for our service too. In 2023, just 23 SACT treatments took place at NSECH. But the 3 of us have administered 150 treatments since starting the service in September 2024. This includes 35 in 2026 alone.

We are immensely proud of this, as we want to provide a service which makes things easier for patients, as well as colleagues, who have also shared positive feedback about our service.

Due to the nature of what we do, we work with and alongside many colleagues in the hospital, collaborating with everyone from oncology and pharmacy teams to rheumatology, ward teams, porters, and waste management.

It’s been a busy and rewarding first 18 months, and we are looking at ways to develop our service further in the months ahead.

For example, we are just about to introduce the delivery of initial bispecific antibody therapies to our service. These are a type of immunotherapy are mostly used to treat blood cancers. Previously patients would have be admitted to other regional treatment centres to receive them.