[Agenda for dissemination of peer support by cancer survivors]

The 2012 revision of the Basic Plan to Promote Cancer Control Programs explicitly recommends the enhancement of peer support. As of October 2013, only 20% of all designated regional and prefectural core hospitals and centers for cancer care formally promote peer support. Accordingly, the national government has been organizing training courses on peer support. Even so, peer support is not readily available. CancerNet Japan, a non-profit organization, has organized a peer support system at four designated cancer care hospitals in the Kanagawa prefecture, in association with the government. Peer supporters are breast cancer survivors who have completed the"Breast Cancer Survivor Coordinator Training Program,a course organized by CancerNet Japan since 2007, and have been officially certified as coordinators after course completion. These peer supporters have not only learned from their own experience but have also studied scientific medical information on cancer. The manner in which supportive activities are conducted in these four hospitals varies according to environment; for example, a dedicated booth may be set up or a standby coordinator may be stationed in a dedicated support room. The most common issue dealt with was the fear expressed by patients or their families, and supporter responses were primarily to attentively listen to them. In this paper, we review our activities with regard to the following three areas of interest:(1) intra-institutional coordination within each hospital, (2) supporter-related issues, and (3) financial resources for efforts involved in the proposed structured peer support system to be adopted at a large number of hospitals nationwide.