This article introduces the Horizon Europe-funded EU NAVIGATE project, an interdisciplinary and cross-country initiative (2022–2027) focused on adapting, implementing, and evaluating a navigation intervention for older people with cancer and their family caregivers in six European countries.
The project addresses the growing challenge of cancer in older age, where a significant proportion of new diagnoses and cancer-related deaths occur in individuals over 65. Older people with cancer often face unique challenges, including receiving less oncological treatment and experiencing unmet physical, medical, emotional, psychosocial, and practical needs. Many also struggle to navigate fragmented health, social, and community care services, leading to delayed access to supportive and palliative care.
In response, EU NAVIGATE aims to enhance support, education, and empowerment for this vulnerable population by leveraging navigation interventions. The core of the project involves adapting a successful Canadian volunteer program called Nav-CARE© (Navigation: Connecting, Advocating, Resourcing, and Engaging) into NavCare-EU for implementation in Belgium, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, and Portugal. Nav-CARE© is a person- and family-centred intervention that utilizes trained navigators (volunteers or social workers, depending on the country) to collaborate with older people and their families to improve quality of life, foster empowerment, and facilitate timely access to health and social services. Navigators focus on connecting clients to social supports, advocating for their quality-of-life goals, identifying and resourcing needs, and engaging clients in what is most meaningful to them.
The project’s design centers around an international pragmatic randomized controlled trial (RCT), complemented by a mixed-method process evaluation. Key objectives of EU NAVIGATE include evaluating the effectiveness (on global health status, quality of life, and social support) and cost-effectiveness of NavCare-EU, understanding its implementation processes across different healthcare systems, and examining its differential effects in patient subgroups based on factors like gender, age, and socio-economic status. Additionally, the project includes a mapping study of existing cancer navigation interventions worldwide to position NavCare-EU within the broader field.
Ultimately, EU NAVIGATE seeks to deliver high-quality evidence to develop evidence-based and multi-stakeholder-informed policy and practice recommendations for sustainable implementation of cancer navigation interventions in Europe and beyond. The anticipated impacts include a better quality of life for older people with cancer and their family caregivers, timely and improved access to high-quality care, reduced societal and economic burden, and empowered patients and caregivers through enhanced support and information.
Reference: Miranda, R., Smets, T., Pivodic, L., Chambaere, K., Pesut, B., Duggleby, W., Onwuteaka-Philipsen, B. D., Gomes, B., May, P., Szczerbińska, K., Davies, A. N., Ferraris, D., Pasman, H. R., Furlan de Brito, M., Barańska, I., Gangeri, L., & Van den Block, L. (2024). Adapting, implementing and evaluating a navigation intervention for older people with cancer and their family caregivers in six countries in Europe: the Horizon Europe-funded EU NAVIGATE project. Palliative Care & Social Practice, 18, 1–17.
