Disease Multidisciplinary Teams (DMTs) are coordinated interdisciplinary groups of medical and health professionals dedicated to a specific disease, and may also include General Practitioners and representatives of Patients’ Associations.

DMTs aim to make shared, evidence-based clinical decisions and to coordinate the delivery of care at every stage of the treatment process, encouraging patients to be active participants in this care pathway.

DMT activities have to be inspired to a well established and approved  Diagnostic-Therapeutic-Assistance Pathway (PDTA) for that specific disease at an institutional or also regional level

From the time of diagnosis, DMTs must ensure the preparation of an individual care plan (IAP), including, based on clinical and anatomo-pathological data:

• the most appropriate diagnostic and staging tests;
• the most appropriate treatment;
• the psychological support;
• the necessary level of care and rehabilitative interventions;
• the possible activation of parallel services, such as pain therapy or concurrent palliative care.

This decision-making process must be supported by clinical and scientific evidence, based on defined national and international guidelines.

The Team can provide options about the inclusion of patients in clinical trials and, for patients resistant to treatment or with relapses that are no longer treatable with first- and second-line therapies, consider inclusion in a Phase 1 clinical trial.

In the next phase, the patient should be referred to specific follow-up programs, also calibrated according to the risk of disease recurrence or complication.

Governance

The three main DMT management figures are: the DMT Coordinator, the case manager and the DMT Secretary.

Team members

The DMT consists of Physicians, Psychologists, Biologists, Nurses, Physiotherapists, and all the "necessary" professional types that contribute to the functioning of the DMT or provided for in the PDTA. DMTs may also include professionals from the field of clinical-scientific research.