Coping with the clinical complexity of adolescents with cancer: an ad hoc Italian scientific society is born (SIAMO)

Adolescents with cancer are a unique group, with special characteristics. Patients in this age group seem to inhabit a "no man's land", neither belonging to the pediatric nor to the adult worlds of oncology. Their optimal management (e.g. coping with their complex psychological and social needs, providing age-appropriate facilities, their access to referral cancer centers and the inclusion in clinical trials) remains a challenge that requires broad-based processes. In 2014 SIAMO, an Italian national comprehensive project dedicated to adolescents with cancer, has been founded, with the main aim of bridging the gap of the inadequate access to optimal cancer services and the lack of improvement in survival rates observed for patients in this age group.