The Royal Melbourne Hospital Scrub Choir set the vibe and lifted us up for the annual VCCC Alliance Awards, celebrating the best and brightest minds in cancer research, care and lived experience leadership.
The Victorian Health Minister Mary-Anne Thomas MP voiced her support for the VCCC Alliance and our work together to deliver better outcomes for all Victorians affected by cancer.
We were moved by Caitlin Delaney's poignant keynote address, reminding us not only of the importance of lived experience leadership but to be mindful of the personal toll that advocacy can take when living with incurable cancer.
Twelve awards were presented throughout the evening including the Picchi Awards, Master of Cancer Sciences Awards, Leading for Impact awards, Tony Burgess Medal, and the Jo Leonard Memorial Scholarship.
Introduced by CEO Prof Grant McArthur AO, Ms Thomas said Victoria was home to some of the highest cancer survival rates, and speaking to those gathered, told the audience: “you are part of that very impressive important cohort who have helped us achieve that here in Victoria”.
Despite this, she said cancer still remains a major health challenge with very high mortality rates for some cancers, projections of a rise in cancer diagnoses, and an increase in young people impacted by cancers such as bowel cancer.
“We consider the VCCC Alliance as a significant and critical partner in helping us deliver on that promise that we’ve made to the Victorian people through the Cancer Plan,” she said, noting the alliance’s role in data linkage research, expanding access to clinical trials across regional and rural Victoria, and driving consumer-led research.
“The Victorian government will continue to work alongside the VCCC Alliance in our collective mission, to reduce cancer incidence, expand access to life-changing treatment and support, and deliver better outcomes for every Victorian affected by cancer,” she said.
Keynote speaker Caitlin Delaney shared her story of being diagnosed with Stage 4 Clear Cell Ovarian Cancer (Caitin also shared her story with us for International Women’s Day 2024) – an underfunded cancer. While it was not the life she planned for herself, she said her life had become a life of purpose where she advocated for more time with her family and for others – “to ensure the next person diagnosed with a rare cancer has a better, more equitable experience”.
Caitlin has lived with the cancer for nearly nine years, experienced 14 lines of different treatment including surgery, radiotherapy, immunotherapy and targeted treatments, and now experiences incurable disease, with the cancer in her lungs, liver, lymph nodes, and spine. Her current treatment regime is a drug available for free for some metastatic breast cancer patients but costs her $10,000 every three weeks. Her family has paid over $250,000 thus far on treatments with the help of crowdfunding. That is the reality of living with rare, less common or complex and advanced cancers.
She said she is driven to keep going for her husband, two young daughters, other patients, and the future of cancer care – a cancer system where every cancer patient has the best chances of survival – and that pan tumour access to treatments is a human right.
Caitlin said her survival was in part a testament to genomic testing and targeted treatments, and she advocates for genomic testing as standard of care for cancer patients at the point of diagnosis, and at recurrence.
She also noted that her advocacy – sharing grief and pain – is triggering and comes at a huge personal cost, often taking her days to recover afterwards.
Caitlin emphasised the importance of listening to the patient voice – that patients are the experts, complimentary to clinicians, and an untapped resource for system improvement, not a system burden.
She said the most effective leadership is grounded in compassion, but it also means collaboration and co-design, in pursuit of a robust, and equitable healthcare system.
Congratulations to all the deserving award winners, hosts Prof. Russell Harrison and Genevieve Overell AM FAICD FGIA, presenters, and colleagues, family and friends who attended.
Tony Burgess Medal
Dr Dane Cheasley, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre
Leading for Impact Awards
Outstanding Leadership by Example – A/Prof Marliese Alexander, Peter Mac
Outstanding Team Leader – Prof Professor Karin (Kas) Thursky Peter Mac
Outstanding Changemaker – Perioperative Medicine Team, Peter Mac
Les Leckie Award for Lived Experience Leadership – Lisa Briggs, Olivia Newton-John Cancer Research Institute, and Liz Dawes OAM CEO Robert Connor Dawes (RCD) Foundation
Master of Cancer Sciences
Prof Robert Thomas OAM Dux – Elena Bayly-McCredie
Top Monograph – Aonghus McCarthy
Jo Leonard Memorial Scholarship
Christine De Nardo, Olivia Newton-John Cancer Research Institute
Picchi Awards
Anu Oommen
Hannah Walker
Yap Kah Min
