ABOUT

CONNECT is a public-private consortium driving the implementation of precision cancer medicine by jointly addressing key obstacles and piloting novel solutions to transform the current practice.

The consortium has been initiated by 22 founding partners in December 2020, attracted multiple additional partners since then and is coordinated by Oslo Cancer Cluster. CONNECT gathers all Norwegian university hospitals, pharmaceutical and technology companies, the Norwegian Cancer Society as a patient organisation, the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, the Norwegian Directorate of Health, and the Norwegian Medicines Agency. The consortium is open to include new partners from the industry and public sector.

Via CONNECT a structured dialogue, information sharing and planning for national precision medicine and diagnostics implementation will be established in line with political guidance and ambitions.

CONNECT is a driver for cross-functional and cross-organizational initiatives, workshops, educational formats and provide access to (international) expertise, experts and benchmarking to advance the implementation of precision cancer medicine.

CONNECT is operationalized via three working groups engaging experts from the public and private sector to jointly work towards the following objectives:

Ensure a structured dialogue, information sharing and planning for precision diagnostics implementation engaging key stakeholders.
Monitor progress and learnings and address identified needs and gaps in precision oncology trials and clinical implementation building on the recently launched IMPRESs-trial.
Identify and pilot pathways for funding and reimbursement based on new types of evidence and data sets generated in IMPRESs and other precision oncology trials.
Advance the infrastructure for data capture, storage and access for secondary use, analysis, data sharing and harmonization on a Nordic level.

CONNECT is one of four interconnected initiatives in precision cancer medicine (PCM) that will ensure infrastructure and collaboration on diagnostics, clinical trials, implementation of advanced precision medicine and use of health data.

The sub project CONNECT INSPIRE-BIO aims to establish a better transfer of structured data for molecular analyses from pathology in the hospitals. The goal is to integrate existing and future results of testing for biomarkers/ genetic profiles into the Cancer Register and the National Genome Centre.