The Bradford mouth-cancer website

The popularity of a unique website providing extensive information and support for victims of head-and-neck cancers and their carers has helped place it among this year’s Healthcare IT Effectiveness Award winners.

The website, www.rdoc.org.uk developed and maintained in his free time by Dr Vinod Joshi, Consultant in Restorative Dentistry at Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, features the UK’s only patient-led 24-hour online support group on this subject. With the help of an unpaid website designer, 190+ pages have been created carrying first-hand accounts of patients’ experiences, sections on prevention, treatment, complications and risks and a section for healthcare professionals. It has become an internationally recognised resource for patients.

Dr Joshi told the HITEA judges: “In the course of my work, I realised that my patients and their dentists needed easier access to information, as well as more-comprehensive information, about oral care and advice before, during and after treatment for head-and-neck cancers; also about early detection, treatment and complications of mouth cancers. It also became apparent that these patients needed a support group.”

Further developments are under way to incorporate online translation for ethnic minorities and to add an interactive educational feature. The success of the site’s first three years of operation has enabled the initiation of the Mouth Cancer Foundation, which aims to provide support for patients with cancers of the head and neck and to increase public awareness of the condition.