Impact

TJBCM and its members are driving continued progress in treatment, care and research, made possible through close collaboration with NHS staff, researchers, charity partners, patients and government.

Through its paediatric and adult Centre of Excellence (CoE) initiatives, the Mission collects the largest dataset on treatment, care and research across UK brain tumour centres. Using these insights, the Mission works with NHS teams to deliver major service improvement projects—creating new posts, reorganising services and developing new models of care. This reduces variation in practice and improves patient access to high-quality care.

Using CoE data, the Mission has run three national challenge projects to date: equity in access to genomic testing, improving rehabilitation, and the challenges faced by single-handed neuro-oncologists. Reports from this work outline the underlying drivers of these issues and present community-backed recommendations. Several of these have already been adopted by the NIHR, the NHS or incorporated into new trial proposals, with further implementation ongoing.

Through its thriving 1500+ member Academy, the Mission delivers national and specialty-specific service improvement projects based on CoE data and community input on unmet needs. This has increased the adoption of best practices, developed new specialty guidelines, created training courses for better NHS workforce learning outcomes, improved interdisciplinary and inter-hospital collaboration, and strengthened charity sector partnerships—all contributing to better patient care.

The Mission has so far hosted five neuro-oncology fellows, who are training or have trained with UK leaders in the field, gaining exposure to cutting-edge clinical practice and research while also undertaking independent research projects. Three have already taken up permanent consultant posts within the neuro-oncology community, and we look forward to bringing more talent into the field in the years ahead.

The Mission has to date supported 38 new therapies through the Brain Tumour Research Novel Therapeutics Accelerator to advance treatments, bringing new therapeutics to clinical trials sooner, and improve patient outcomes. All programme applicants received actionable feedback, with 22 selected for 240+ hours of expert guidance. These applicants all reported that the advice led to new insights not previously considered and adjustments in their future work.

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