As the CO-CAPTAIN project moves into its final stage, a series of multi-stakeholder workshops will take place across the four pilot countries — Austria, Greece, Poland and Spain — with a clear objective: transforming project insights into actionable policy recommendations to improve cancer prevention for people living with mental ill-health.
People experiencing mental ill-health face persistent barriers in accessing cancer prevention services, including screening, smoking cessation programmes, physical activity initiatives and healthy diet interventions. These inequalities contribute to poorer health outcomes and highlight the need for more integrated and inclusive prevention pathways.
Over the past years, CO-CAPTAIN has been addressing this challenge by co-adapting and implementing a person-centred Patient Navigation model within different health and care systems across Europe. The model supports individuals in navigating complex prevention pathways and helps bridge the gap between mental health services and cancer prevention programmes.
Now, the project is entering a crucial phase: translating pilot implementation insights into sustainable policy and system-level change.
A collaborative process to shape future prevention policies
The workshops form a key component of Work Package 5, which focuses on developing a blueprint for transforming cancer prevention systems for people with mental health problems across the EU.
Each country will host three structured workshops, bringing together policymakers, health system planners, clinicians, mental health professionals, patient representatives, researchers and civil society organisations.
This participatory approach ensures that recommendations are not only evidence-based, but also feasible within national health systems and aligned with real-world needs.
- Workshop 1 – Validating systems and identifying gaps
The first workshop focuses on validating the mapping of national cancer care pathways for people living with mental ill-health and assessing how newly developed Integrated Cancer Care (ICC) standards align with existing services.
Participants will review system maps, identify fragmentation points between services and discuss barriers related to workforce, governance, digital infrastructure and financing. The goal is to determine which ICC standards can realistically be scaled within each national context.
- Workshop 2 – Co-developing policy recommendations
Building on the system mapping and the experience gained from the pilot interventions, the second workshop will focus on drafting national-level policy recommendations.
Participants will explore how ICC standards could be embedded into existing policies, cancer control plans and health system governance frameworks. Discussions will address key areas such as workforce development, digital health infrastructure, governance mechanisms and financing models.
- Workshop 3 – Validating recommendations with decision-makers
The final workshop will bring together policymakers and key stakeholders to validate the proposed recommendations, using evidence generated through the CO-CAPTAIN pilot implementation.
This step aims to build consensus around feasible pathways for institutional uptake, ensuring that the project’s results contribute to long-term improvements in cancer prevention systems.
Workshop timeline across pilot countries
Workshop 1 – System mapping and standards validation
- Poland: 11 March 2026
- Austria: 12 March 2026
- Spain: 25 March 2026
- Greece: 18 March 2026
Workshop 2 – Drafting policy recommendations
- Austria: 26–27 March 2026 (to be confirmed)
- Greece: 3 April 2026
- Poland: 9 April 2026
- Spain: 14 April 2026
Workshop 3 – Policy validation and next steps
- Poland: 6 May 2026
- Greece: 6 May 2026
- Austria: 7–8 May 2026 (to be confirmed)
- Spain: 12 May 2026
Towards a European blueprint for equitable cancer prevention
The insights generated through these workshops will feed into CO-CAPTAIN’s final policy outputs and contribute to the development of a European blueprint for integrating Patient Navigation and primary cancer prevention programmes into health and care systems.
By combining pilot implementation, stakeholder engagement and policy co-creation, the project aims to ensure that cancer prevention strategies become more inclusive, coordinated and responsive to the needs of people living with mental ill-health.
Ultimately, the CO-CAPTAIN workshops represent more than a dissemination activity — they are a platform for shaping the future of equitable cancer prevention in Europe.
