Doctors.net.uk used its network of medical professionals to generate more than 12,550 visits from over 6,000 GPs to The Royal Marsden’s online cancer centre.
The 12-month educational project provided access to cancer information, with the option of signing up to quarterly educational events at The Royal Marsden, which have covered advances in cancer diagnosis, treatment and care.
In total, the site has received 32,000 interactions and more than 1,500 doctors are now receiving the The Royal Marsden’s GP publication, GP Oncology Update.
“It is widely accepted that GPs can play a critical role in helping to reduce cancer deaths through early diagnosis,” said Simon Grime, managing director of communications at Doctors.net.uk.
“However, in order to do so, they need ongoing information and support from cancer experts.
“Doctors.net.uk has successfully enabled The Royal Marsden to share its extensive knowledge with thousands of GPs and identify key learning gaps, and we will continue to provide them with resources that will improve their clinical practice in this area,” he said.
Part of the campaign included an eCME quiz on breast and prostate cancer, which helped highlight a number of learning gaps. Some GPs were unable to recognise certain ‘red flag’ side effects of breast cancer, while others failed to understand lower urinary tract symptoms in prostate cancer.
Following on from the success of the campaign, The Royal Marsden plan to launch a new 12-month programme via Doctors.net.uk. This time, the network will promote the GP events through a series of webcasts, while continuing to host educational resources in the early diagnosis, treatment and long-term care of specific cancers.
Isabella Douglas, head of marketing for The Royal Marsden, said: “We are delighted with the results of this campaign which has fulfilled a real need among GPs for credible, tailored educational resources that will support them in the early diagnosis and management of cancer patients.
“We look forward to building on this success by working further with GPs to ensure our education programme is relevant to their needs, disseminating key information from our educational events and using knowledge gaps identified through the eCME quizzes to provide further educational resources via Doctors.net.uk.”