TY - JOUR T1 - Highlights from this issue JF - Gut JO - Gut SP - i LP - ii DO - 10.1136/gutjnl-2011-301847 VL - 61 IS - 2 AU - Emad El-Omar AU - William Grady AU - Alexander Gerbes Y1 - 2012/02/01 UR - http://gut.bmj.com/content/61/2/i.abstract N2 - The last 3 decades have seen a threefold increase in the numbers of survivors of cancer. Chronic gastrointestinal side effects are a common cause of morbidity and reduced quality of life. Side effects of treatment are frequently missed or overlooked because the current priority of cancer follow-up is to perform surveillance for recurrent cancer. Individual GPs are unlikely to have many patients with complex problems after cancer therapy and so will require guidance if these patients are to be optimally managed. Symptoms can often be alleviated or cured. In view of the urgent need for guidance on how to manage such patients, the President of the British Society of Gastroenterology commissioned this landmark document following a request from Professor Sir Mike Richards, National Cancer Director, and Professor Jane Maher, Chief Medical Officer of Macmillan Cancer Support and Chair of the National Cancer Survivorship Initiative's Consequences of Treatment Group. The authors of the document, Andreyev and colleagues, are to be congratulated for producing an outstanding account of the clinical problems and their management. This is an area of clinical medicine that is poorly researched yet affects millions of patients on a global scale. Gut has taken the lead on making this a key research priority and we hope the next few years will see the … ER -