The foster plans for chemotherapy specialists selected by the MEXT in Japan

Cancer, being the most common cause of death, develops in about 30% of the Japanese people sometime during their lifetime. In order to confront this problem and improve the Japan's standard of cancer treatment, it is essential to foster the specialists of radiation therapy, chemotherapy and palliative management as well as oncology specific nurses and pharmacist ; fields in which our human resources are extremely limited. The Foster Plan for Cancer Specialists which medical schools in Japan play a key role in, receives the cooperation of other related universities and colleges, and was selected by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) as an anti-cancer project of Japan. In these plans, the chemotherapy specialists (nearly equal to medical oncologists) will be educated mainly at the graduate school level ; with extensive cooperation amongst the universities signed for systematic fostering plans, as well as the hospitals which are designated as partner facilities, in the areas of the prefectures in which the universities are located. This wide-range, professional development system is beyond the framework of the conventional graduate school education ; it requires a system for university credit transfer, hospital-university collaboration, an internet schooling system, and the promotion in enrollment of working personnel. It is also expected to extend its regional framework to include all the universities, university hospitals, center hospitals for cancer treatment, local governments and professional training organizations in the prefectures for promoting its clinical tests and cancer registrations.