The following goals are intended to ensure that everything the Cancer Society does moves us closer to achieving our mission.
- Providing community support
- Advocating for better outcomes
- Supporting research and innovation
- Partnering for impact
Providing Community Support
We’ll support people to access equitable and responsive cancer care that improves their quality of life.
Our strength lies in our reach — being physically present in communities across the country allows us to connect deeply. We’ll use our presence to ensure no one faces cancer alone. We’ll remove barriers and ease burdens to ensure people can live well with cancer and can access equitable and responsive care.
To achieve this, we'll focus on these five things:
We’ll ensure supports are available to those who need them most, when, where and how they need them. That means expanding access to new and existing community services, including psychosocial support, infusion services, screening, pre- and post-rehabilitation services, rongoā Māori, navigation and peer support.
We’ll enhance survivorship care and provide comprehensive pre- and post-rehabilitation services to support individuals throughout their cancer journey.
We’ll codesign integrated care models with families, combining oncology with support services, rongoā Māori, mental health care and end-of-life care.
We’ll use digital tools and technology to meet the growing needs of young adults and rural communities, to ensure equitable access to information, support and care.
We’ll actively engage families with lived experience of cancer to inform and codesign our services, ensuring their perspectives shape care and advocacy. We’ll draw on the collective voice to influence change nationally.
Advocating for Better Outcomes
We’ll focus on addressing the preventable causes of cancer and increasing access to screening, early detection and treatment.
Creating a future free from cancer includes advocating for equitable cancer outcomes across the cancer continuum. We’ll focus on modifiable risk factors and double down on prevention, screening and early detection
Our efforts will go into five key priorities:
We’ll take collaborative action to make cervical cancer a disease of the past. New Zealand has the tools to eliminate cervical cancer — vaccination, screening and treatment. We’ll support people to access them.
Many of the most diagnosed and deadly cancers are preventable. We’ll advocate for sustainable prevention strategies across tobacco, alcohol, obesity, UV protection and immunisation, while keeping a watching brief on vaping.
Early detection saves lives. We’ll push for free and equitable access to screening, investment in new programmes and targeted awareness campaigns to find and treat cancers earlier.
Everyone with cancer should have access to timely, high-quality care and support. We’ll advocate for:
- improvements in treatment time frames, workforce and infrastructure
- services closer to home
- better travel assistance
- access to supportive, palliative and end-of-life care.
We’ll also support ongoing investment in new cancer medicines.
Skin cancer places the greatest financial burden on our health system. We’ll prioritise efforts to prevent and detect skin cancers early, reducing long-term healthcare costs and improving outcomes for New Zealanders.
Supporting Research and Innovation
We’ll increase our investment in research and innovation. We’ll drive targeted, equitable and evidence-based outcomes that advance our strategic priorities.
We’ll work toward a future free from cancer by strengthening research and innovation across the cancer continuum — from prevention to survivorship and end of life. By adopting new evidence, treatments and care models faster, we aim to improve outcomes and quality of life and ensure fair access for all New Zealanders.
We’ll prioritise our efforts and investment in four areas:
We’ll unify our resources and energy to deliver coordinated, strategic action, so we maximise our collective impact for future generations. This will include building mechanisms to elevate patient and community voices.
We’ll use research to understand patient and whānau needs better, and apply those insights to adapt cancer care services. We’ll fund research that strengthens our advocacy to provide evidence for meaningful policy and system change.
We’ll support a growing and capable cancer research workforce through educational opportunities, scholarships with mentoring, and project grants.
We’ll connect people and organisations across the sector, support infrastructure and enable knowledge to be translated into real-world settings to improve care and outcomes.
Partnering for Impact
We’ll unite and align Cancer Society efforts, collaborating across the health sector to drive large-scale change.
To contribute to a future free from cancer, we’ll collaborate to enhance our impact. We’ll unite our expertise, resources and voices to create stronger, more effective solutions that better serve the needs of whānau impacted by cancer.
Our four priorities are:
We’ll build and nurture formal alliances that result in coordinated efforts and address shared challenges. By working together, we can reduce duplication, close gaps in care and create a seamless experience for those we support.
We’ll collaborate with Māori and Pacific leaders and organisations to deliver culturally safe, equitable cancer care. This includes codesigning initiatives that address the unique needs of these communities and embedding tino rangatiratanga into all aspects of our mahi.
We’ll expand and create shared value partnerships to unlock new funding opportunities and make the most of resources. These partnerships will support innovation, scale successful initiatives and increase our ability to deliver impactful programs to communities across Aotearoa New Zealand.
We’ll unite in our vision. We’ll look for opportunities to maximise our reach and impact through consolidation where it makes sense.
