Abstract
The care for children suffering from a brain tumor is complex and involves a lot of different (para-) medical disciplines. All health care professionals have their own expertise in taking care of a child with a brain tumor. In 2013, a nurse-led clinic for children with brain tumors was introduced in our ward. The goal of this clinic was to improve patient care by introducing a nurse consultant as case manager during the pathway of their diagnosis and treatment. Working in this structure made us clear that we needed to align all the concerned disciplines and to insert transparency in the various functions of the team. Moreover, the role of the nurse consultant had to be anchored in this pathway. As first action in the development of our care pathway, we enumerated and analyzed the bottlenecks in the care. We listened and talked to every single partaker of other disciplines and critically observed the current workflow. We decided that a monthly multidisciplinary meeting could improve the communication and co-operation between the health care professionals. Our final care pathway is a detailed description of all steps: registration, diagnosis, treatment and follow up. It is available throughout the entire hospital, via an easily accessible document managing system in which it is possible to have a quick overview of all tasks for each care professional, in each care-episode. Our future plans are to organize a transition of our adolescent patients to a clinic specialized in late effects after brain tumor treatment.