Invitation to tender for the provision of a Cancer Genetic Testing and Courier Services for Genetic Testing in St James’s Hospital .

The cancer genetic service is based at St James Hosptial since 1990. and is a national referral center for adult inherited cancer genetics. Patients are referred from general practitioners, regional hospitals and cancer centres for cancer genetic counselling, risk assessment and genetic testing. The service is working towards the newly published National Cancer Control Programme (NCCP) Hereditary Model of Care and the vision of delivering a timely cancer genomics service for patients throughout Ireland. The NCCP Hereditary Model of care aligns with the recently published Genomics Strategy for Ireland in 2022. St James Hospital cancer genetic service provides cancer genetic counselling and testing to individuals with and without cancer. In 2022, 1040 new patients were seen in the service. Cancer genetic testing occurs after pre-test counselling and consent and remote testing with saliva, blood or buccal samples sent to patients address or collected on site and couriered to a testing provider. The Cancer Genetic Service performed 602 cancer genetic diagnostic tests and 164 predictive tests in 2022.