The Christie Institute for Cancer Education has welcomed international colleagues from the National Cancer Institute of Ukraine (UNCI) as part of a new education partnership focused on bilateral sharing of knowledge, experience and ideas to strengthen cancer care and workforce development.
In December 2025, The Christie welcomed the first of three cohorts of Ukrainian observers through the SCALE programme (Strengthening Health Workforce Capacity through Global Learning), funded by Global Health Partnerships, with links to the Department of Health and Social Care as part of the wider 'International Medical Partnerships’ initiative the programme marks the start of a long-term commitment to shared learning and collaboration.
This SCALE project, provides the opportunity for learning between The Christie and the UNCI. Through in-person visits and virtual masterclasses, we have been able to exchange ideas between our respective healthcare professionals to learn from one another on how we can improve and develop our cancer care, research, and education – both in the UK and Ukraine.
Sharing across the specialisms
Across the 3 observership visits colleagues from the National Cancer Institute of Ukraine (UNCI) joined teams at The Christie to gain insight into specialist services, while also sharing their own experience of delivering cancer care in highly challenging circumstances.
We welcomed our first cohort in December with a specialism in Clinical Oncology and they were supervised by Professor Ananya Choudhury, who said “Welcoming colleagues from the Ukraine National Cancer Centre to The Christie has been both humbling and inspiring. Their commitment to delivering high-quality cancer care under extraordinary circumstances reinforces why collaboration and solidarity across borders matter so much.”
Observer Danylo Kovalenko, a Medical Physicist at the National Cancer Institute of Ukraine, enjoyed his time observing in our scientific departments, saying “ I met very great and honourable people who work in your scientific departments doing a great job, and I believe we will use protocols and knowledge, and we will implement it in our treatment systems”
The second cohort arrived the following week with a focus on Surgery. Supervised by Professor Omer Aziz, Colorectal Surgeon, the visit saw observers and colleagues sharing experiences of key cancer surgeries. Professor Aziz said, ” Hearing about the challenges of delivering cancer care during war and conflict was a sobering experience. We are grateful to our Ukrainian surgical colleagues for making the trip to Manchester at a hazardous time. Through sharing our mutual experience, we hope to build a strong bond between our teams.’
Observer Valerii Kostikov a Gynaecologist-Oncologist and a PhD in Medicine from UNCI told us that he was particularly impressed with our Nursing programme “I'm very impressed by your nurses, the jobs they're doing, how it works, how their work is organised... and, I think we need to implement this back in Kyiv because it makes the job a lot easier and more focused on the patient"
We were honoured to welcome Dr Zubir Ahmed, current Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Health and Social Care to The Christie, who met with our Christie surgeons and our Ukrainian observers and said “I’ve met with Ukrainian surgeons who have come here to learn and bring that back to their citizens, because even in a time of war, cancer doesn’t stop”. You can watch his full interview captured by BBC below.
January saw the arrival of our third and final cohort. Supervised by Dr Jonathan Lim, Clinical Senior Lecturer and Honorary Consultant Medical Oncologist, this group spent time across several medical oncology services across The Christie, working with colleagues and offering ideas and experiences.
Dr Lim, said: “It was a real privilege to welcome our Ukrainian colleagues — a powerful reminder of the strength of collaboration, even in the most challenging times.”
We caught up with observer, Dr Veronika Patsko, Medical Oncologist, who told us that she too was particularly impressed with our nursing provision and set up here at The Christie stating “ The main thing that I would like to transfer from The Christie to the National Cancer Institute is the nursing system, because the nurses service is so developed here, and education of nurses is so profound, and we would like to have something like this in our centre. I realise that it'll take some time, but seeing such a great experience at The Christie, we are more inspired to develop it in our centre as well”.
Cancer doesn’t stop. Neither do we.
“As our colleagues acknowledged in their end of seminar presentations – even during war time, cancer does not stop. So, it is a privilege to support these teams in any way we can as they continue their efforts to deliver the best possible services to their patients in extremely challenging circumstances.” Rachel Chown, Associate Director - Research and Education Strategy.
This SCALE project was made possible by funding through Global Health Partnerships and we hope to continue to work closely with colleagues from UNCI and across Ukraine.
Our Associate Director – Research and Education Strategy, Rachel Chown, has been invited to deliver the keynote session at the upcoming UK Global Health Summit on Wednesday 18 March 2026 at The Royal College of Physicians in London, which will be focussed on the benefits of health partnerships such as this one.
To hear more from our observers, please visit our Observerships webpage.