Multidisciplinary team

When you’re being treated for cancer, it’s best for you to be cared for by a multidisciplinary team. A multidisciplinary team (MDT) in cancer treatment involves a team of health professionals who will work together to plan the treatment they feel is best for you. 

Having a multidisciplinary team for your cancer treatment can help make sure you get the best possible treatment at the right time, because the team is drawing on all its knowledge and experience.

Who is in the multidisciplinary team?

It depends on what type of cancer you have, and where you’re being treated, but there will most likely include your GP/doctor, a surgeon, an oncologist, a radiotherapist, a cancer nurse and a health worker.

Multidisciplinary teams should also have someone expert in culturally appropriate care, so they should have an Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander health worker or an Aboriginal liaison officer. You can check and make sure that they do.

There might also be people like a physiotherapist, a speech therapist, a psychiatrist and more.

You can read about what these people do at Which health professional might you see?

What do the multidisciplinary members do?

The main thing the multidisciplinary team do is talk to each other about you and your specific cancer and the treatment plan that is best for you.

Lots of people who go to hospital have found that they have to tell their story over and over again, and that one lot of doctors isn’t always aware of what another lot is doing. Multidisciplinary teams aim to make sure this doesn’t happen so you get the best care.