Europacolon Portugal – Support for Patients with Digestive Cancer is an IPSS, a non-profit entity, founded in 2006, in Porto, with the primary function of contributing to the reduction of the number of deaths from Bowel Cancer and supporting patients and their families, improving their quality of life, having extended its scope in 2014 for all oncological diseases of the digestive, including cancer of the pancreas, stomach, liver, oesophagus, neuroendocrine tumours and GIST.

Currently, Digestive Cancer has an incidence in Portugal of more than 16600 cases per year and a mortality of more than 10054! (Globocan 2018). The high incidence of these diseases and the permanent lack of a national health policy, focused on prevention and early diagnosis, justifies the need for an NGO dedicated to this issue of Public Health.

As such, Europacolon Portugal has a fundamental role, because its scope covers all oncological diseases, from the digestive forum, and is based on 4 pillars:

1. Support for patients, survivors, family members and caregivers.
2. Pressure and awareness of policy makers to implement the preventive and early diagnosis attitudes necessary for the reduction and, above all, of the mortality of these diseases
3. Actions to raise awareness among the population to increase health literacy and motivation for user participation in therapeutic decisions
4. Involvement in research projects in the areas described in order to increase research funding and population participation, where necessary, in these projects