“Quality of life–integrated approaches to improve treatment of rare and/or hard-to-treat cancers through pragmatic clinical trials”
The FORCE consortium is united by the shared ambition to create a structured and focused funding framework to support world-class patient-centred research tackling high and unmet patient needs in oncology. FORCE aims for practice‑changing evidence that is directly applicable to real‑world cancer care across Europe. The FORCE consortium will soon launch its first call for proposals supporting transnational, investigator‑initiated pragmatic clinical trials designed to improve treatment strategies for patients with rare and/or hard‑to‑treat cancers.
Ambition of the 1st FORCE Joint Call for Proposals
This call will support pragmatic clinical trials conducted in routine healthcare settings, with a systematic and explicit integration of quality‑of‑life outcomes alongside clinical effectiveness. Whereas explanatory trials mainly focus on clinical endpoints, FORCE‑supported studies are expected to place patients lived experience, treatment burden, and daily functioning at the center of research questions and decision‑making.
Submitted projects should address practical, clinically relevant questions that conventional regulatory trials frequently leave unanswered, such as how existing interventions can be used more effectively, safely, sustainably, and with less burden for patients. By embedding trials in everyday clinical practice and involving representative patient populations, FORCE aims to support studies with high implementation potential and rapid uptake across diverse European healthcare systems.
Scope and requirements of supported research:
- Investigator-initiated international pragmatic clinical trials that are close to real-world patient impact, in at least 3 European funding countries: France, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Poland, Latvia, Ireland and Italy.
- The trial must address rare (incidence <6/100.000/year) and/or hard‑to‑treat cancers with a robust justification based on epidemiological and/or clinical evidence. Under specified conditions, rare and/or hard-to-treat subgroups within more common cancer types are also eligible.
- The submission of trials specifically designed for, or explicitly incorporating the paediatric patient population, is encouraged.
- The research question must respond to unmet patient needs defined jointly with patients and/or their representatives. Outcomes must be both patient‑centered and informative for routine clinical decision‑making, with quality-of-life as a core consideration.
- Interventions already established in clinical practice, including both pharmacological as well as non‑pharmacological interventions such as radiotherapy and surgery, are fit-to-call.
- Meaningful patient involvement is mandatory throughout the full trial lifecycle, including design, implementation, interpretation, and dissemination.
- Trial design must be driven by pragmatism, embedding pragmatic features fit-for-purpose that facilitate rapid integration into clinical practice and ensure real-world applicability and accessibility across diverse European healthcare settings.
Please note that the information provided outlines a limited overview of the requirements for this Call for Proposals. The complete set of requirements, together with additional guidance, will be published on the FORCE website (https://force4cancer.eu/) at the launch of the Call for Proposals.
To stay informed about this call and its launch, please subscribe to the newsletter via the following link: https://force4cancer.eu/newsletter/
Timelines
Launch of the Call for Proposals: week of June 29, 2026
Deadline for submission of preproposals: week of September 21, 2026
Deadline for submission of full proposals: January 2027
Funding decision foreseen by the end of May 2027