What is people centred care?

Treat the person, not just the disease.

People living with cancer don’t always feel heard, seen, or understood. They might feel alienated and voiceless at a time when they’re also learning to navigate an unfamiliar and confusing health system, not to mention dealing with the emotional highs and lows of cancer diagnosis, treatment, or recovery.

People-centred cancer care represents an opportunity to refocus, rewire, and rewrite how we think about cancer, to embrace people’s differences, and to make sure that everyone is seen for who they really are and has access to the care they need.

How does it work?

It’s about collaboration.

People-centred care reorients healthcare around people instead of diseases. It recognises that every person is unique and prioritises their needs, hears their concerns with compassion and empathy, helps them retain autonomy, and empowers them to actively participate in the decision-making process rather than simply being passive receivers of care.

It’s about connection.

People-centred care also recognises the importance of social ties. It seeks to engage individuals, families, and communities beyond the clinical setting and is built on the knowledge that involving these connections enables more humane and holistic care that better meets a person’s unique physical, mental, and spiritual needs.

It’s about community.

People are more than just patients, and before they ever interact with a healthcare system, they benefit by being informed and engaged. Taking a community approach to cancer care improves health literacy and self-care while ensuring that health systems meet the real-world needs of the people they serve.

It’s a proven approach

Support for a people-centred care approach has been growing for years, and for good reason: it improves access to care and provides many positive effects throughout treatment and recovery, leading to improvements in both physical and emotional wellbeing. The World Health Organization has written that developing more integrated people-centred care systems “has the potential to generate significant benefits to the health and healthcare of all people.”

Studies show that integrated people-centred care models:

Result in individuals feeling better throughout treatment
Lead to higher quality of care and more trust in doctors
Increase overall satisfaction among patients and families
Improve the morale of healthcare workers
Reduce disparities in access to and in the delivery of services, ensuring that everyone can receive the care they need, when and where they need it

Enhance efficiency by providing services in the most cost-effective manner, balancing health promotion, prevention, and treatment, and minimising resource waste
Bolsters resilience by strengthening the capacity of health systems to respond effectively to public health crises, ensuring that no one is left behind.

It turns out that when a compassionate, humanising, and empowering approach is thoroughly incorporated into a health system – one that not only understands but values a person’s inherent uniqueness – it creates a different kind of relationship between patient and provider. It brings everyone closer together.

In short, it allows us all to be United by Unique.

What’s in a name?
Patient vs Person vs People

In healthcare, you’ll hear about people-centred care, but also “person-centred” and “patient-centred care”. These terms are closely related and are often used interchangeably. But they are not the same.

Patient-centred care respects a patient’s feelings, values, and preferences about their own care. It emphasises the importance of treating patients as partners and can involve shared decision-making. The care is coordinated across different services and providers to help ensure that all aspects of the treatment are aligned, reducing confusion and improving the overall experience. Patient-centred care specifically relates to the clinical context and interactions within a healthcare system.

Person-centred care expands the focus beyond the patient to the individual as a whole person and considers all aspects of their life, not just their disease. It values people’s unique experiences and wishes, including psychological, social, and spiritual needs. It supports the individual in a holistic manner, taking their personal life, identity, and social context into account.

People-centred care takes the most valuable elements of the patient- and person-centred models and places them within the broader context of community. This model takes the widest possible view, as individuals actively participate in their treatment and their experiences and values are heard and respected, while it engages families, social connections, and wider communities as vital pillars of high-quality cancer care. It’s also intended to address the health of entire populations, ensuring that healthcare systems are designed to serve all people equitably and inclusively.

In conclusion

Patient-centred care focuses specifically on the individual as a patient within the healthcare system.

Person-centred care considers the individual holistically, within the broader context of their life.

People-centred care focuses on the health and well-being of entire populations or communities, aiming to improve healthcare systems and access for all.

All approaches are essential for delivering comprehensive and effective healthcare, and while the World Cancer Day campaign theme particularly highlights ‘people-centred care’, it does, of course, encompass the key elements and driving force of person- and patient-centred care approaches.

Explore more

The new World Cancer Day theme 2025-2027 "United by Unique" places patients and people at the centre of care and their stories at the heart of the conversation.