At a public meeting on 14 March 2024, NHS England selected Evelina London Children's Hospital as the future location for very specialist cancer treatment services for children living in south London and much of south east England.
It comes after a rigorous process to decide the location of the future centre, including a public consultation and considering the opinions of clinical advisers, parents, charities, nurses, doctors and research staff.
We will be bringing together staff from the current Principal Treatment Centre with the many specialist teams at Evelina London who already care for children with complex medical conditions. Working together we will create a service to provide joined up and innovative care for children with cancer in family-friendly facilities.
As part of this change, it was agreed that conventional radiotherapy services will in future be provided at University College Hospital in central London.
What's next?
We are fully committed to working with patients, their families, staff from the current service, and other partners to design the new service with children, young people and staff at its heart. This will ensure continuity of care during the transition period and a plan for the safe transfer of the service.
This will not be before October 2026, and there will be no sudden changes to children’s care in the meantime.
Before the decision was made, a programme of work to decide the future location was led by NHS England (London and south east regions). Now that the programme has moved to the next phase to transfer the service, Evelina London will take the lead.
Get involved
There are lots of ways that you can influence the decisions we make in shaping the future Children's Cancer Principal Treatment Centre. Find out how children, young people and families can get involved.
Watch a film about Evelina London's plans for children's cancer services
Our Medical Director, Dr Sara Hanna, explains more about the services Evelina London currently provides and our vision for the future children's cancer service in south London and south east England
I'm Sara Hanna, and I'm medical director of Evelina London. At Evelina London, we have been passionate about providing the best possible care to children and their families for more than 150 years.
We can do this because of our 4,000 dedicated and compassionate staff spanning more than 30 specialist areas. No other children's hospital in the region offers that breadth and scale of expertise dedicated to children, and that's why we believe we are uniquely placed to deliver care to those children with cancer who require the most complex treatment.
We have 50 specialist children's surgeons operating within 10 theatres, more children in research studies than any hospital in London, and our exceptional facilities mean our teams can extend pioneering research of new cancer therapies to children.
We have the region's only kidney and heart services undertaking the most complex operations and 24/7 access to child-friendly, state-of-the-art imaging facilities, some of which are not found elsewhere in the UK.
Our critical care transport service safely moves the sickest children from their local hospitals for intensive care, including children with cancer. Our doctors and nurses provide advice, education, and training to every hospital in the region so treatment can start even before our teams arrive.
The design of the hospital was inspired by children and families, bright and friendly spaces, with plenty of places to play. We have overnight accommodation for 60 families in our Ronald McDonald House.
We will design the cancer facility, including dedicated parking and a transport service, together with families and staff. Our Trust has a long history of cancer services at Guy's Hospital, already treating teenagers and young adults.
We believe we will provide the best care for children and young people with cancer and the highly skilled staff that support them.
Watch a video addressing some of the frequently asked questions about the future children's cancer service
Our Medical Director, Dr Sara Hanna, answers frequently asked questions about the move of the Children's Cancer Principal Treatment Centre.
As the region's only dedicated children's hospital, we really understand how tough it is to be the family member of a seriously unwell child, and how important it is that children can easily access the specialist care they need.
We also know that parents and patients might be anxious about what the proposed changes to the Principal Treatment Centre may mean for their care.
We want to help put their minds at ease.
The current children's cancer service is not closing.
It is moving to a new hospital.
The vast majority of the existing children's team at the Royal Marsden will move too, meaning children and their families will continue to be supported by the clinicians they know and they trust.
At Evelina London we already care for children with cancer.
We provide specialist heart and kidney care to the current Principal Treatment Centre, and our Intensive Care Ambulance Team transfers the sickest children with cancer between hospitals, including transferring children between the Royal Marsden and St George's.
As well as state-of-the-art facilities, our plans involve making travelling to the new centre as worry-free as possible.
This includes a fleet of cars that will collect children from their homes wherever they live, bring them to the hospital and drive them safely home afterwards.
There will also be free, bookable parking for families who travel in their own car, a drop-off zone right outside the door and hassle-free reimbursement of ULEZ and congestion charging.
Moving the Children's Cancer Centre provides a once-in-a-generation opportunity to build on what the exceptional teams at the Royal Marsden already do.
Evelina London is the only option that can offer children access to a broad range of paediatric experts 24 hours a day, and we have been independently assessed as offering the best opportunity to advance children's cancer research.
Bringing the Principal Treatment Centre to Evelina London will mean that children with cancer in our region will benefit from being cared for in a dedicated children's hospital, just like every other child with cancer in the UK.
This is what children in our region deserve.
More information
For more information about the future children's cancer services visit the NHS England website.
Find out how you can get involved in shaping the future services at Evelina London.
Our frequently asked questions page has more information about our plans for future children's cancer services.