Oesophageal/stomach cancer

For oesophageal/stomach cancer, the following centres are most frequently mentioned by the specialists who responded to our survey (in alphabetical order):

  • Amsterdam UMC (AMC site)
  • Antoni van Leeuwenhoek Hospital (Amsterdam)
  • Erasmus MC (Rotterdam)
  • UMC Utrecht (AZU site)

We urge you to have an in-depth discussion with your general practioner and attending specialist(s) about choosing the centre where you would like to be treated. You will need to weigh up multiple aspects and criteria when making this choice and you can take the opinion of the medical specialists presented here into account.

The four centres mentioned above are the most frequently mentioned by our panel. The advantage of this method is that it is very unlikely that a poor quality centre will emerge in this way. However, some nuances and complexities may not always be fully taken into account and it may also happen that other centres of excellence are unfortunately not mentioned.

Here are 2 sets of questions to help you choose a centre of excellence specific to your individual case, to enable you gain maximum insight into your treatment choices and influence your treatment plan:

  1. You can ask if there is talk of a (regional) consultation involving all the different centres:
  2. where all relevant specialties e.g. diagnosis, treatment, aftercare, rehabilitation etc. are represented i.e. a multidisciplinary consultation
  3. where all patient cases from all participating centres are discussed
  4. where all the different treatment options are assessed and laid down by the specialists. If this is the case, ask if you can have access to the report from that discussion.
  • You can then discuss this report with your doctor using the following questions:
  • Do I have a choice?
  • What are those choices?
    • What are the consequences?
    • What are the pros and cons, risks and opportunities for each of the options?
  • What life priorities, ambitions and intentions are important for me right now?

A careful consideration of each of those choices in light of your personal wishes will enable you to come to a “joint decision” with your general practitioner and attending specialist(s), even if that means that all or part of the treatment takes place in another centre that may be better equipped for this.

We would appreciate your feedback on the usefulness of this information together with your suggestions for any future developments via the form on the Contact page.