Professor Maeve Lowery:

Yes, I do. There is a good example on the campus on which I work of how academia can work directly with patients and interact with patient care and those of us who provide patient care and those of us who straddle both worlds, if you like. A couple of years ago, we established a cancer institute on the St. James's campus and on the Trinity College campus, namely, the Trinity St. James's Cancer Institute.

In 2019 we achieved designation from the Organisation of European Cancer Institutes, OECI, as a joint entity as a cancer centre. It was an international benchmarking that showed we as joint collaborators, hospital and university, integrating research into the education of both patients and our healthcare staff but also integrating that directly into patient clinical care. That is the international model of how excellent patient care is provided. That is what it is our vision, on an all-Ireland basis, to do. It is to take research from the academic institutions' silos and bring it to the patients. That, as Mr. Molloy pointed out, should be a two-way process. It must have patient involvement from the very beginning.

Mr. Molloy's point is really well-made. We have not been good enough at ensuring the right patients are at the table at all those discussions because there are some patients who have a very high healthcare literacy and they feel cancer research is relevant to them and that they can come and ask me questions, Google things and come with a level of expertise around their cancer that is hugely impressive. I met those patients when I lived in New York and I meet them now I live in Dublin. However, I also meet the other patients who feel cancer research does not really apply to them and who would not feel they have the language, knowledge or maybe the education to be able to take ownership of that and to participate in these two-way discussions. That is on us. It is on us as a research and clinical community to go out there and provide for all patients from all economic and social backgrounds and from all racial backgrounds to be able to sit at the table and not have silos whereby some people feel it applies to them and some feel it does not. That is something I have noticed personally. It is really important that equity of access is applied across the board.