The mission of the Children's Oncology Group (COG) is to cure and prevent childhood and adolescent cancer through scientific discovery and compassionate care. Our vision is to eliminate the personal, familial, and societal burden of cancer in children and adolescents by conducting, treatment trials, etiologic and prevention studies to lessen the burden of treatment-related sequelae and improve survivorship. First funded in 2002, this application is for COG to continue to serve as a Treatment and Cancer Prevention and Control Community Clinical Oncology Program (CCOP) Research Base. COG is the largest childhood cancer research organization in the world encompassing 231 pediatric cancer programs including 27 affiliated with CCOPs/Minority-Based CCOPs. The COG CCOP Research Base utilizes the organization and facilities of the COG to provide community pediatric cancer treatment centers access to treatment, cancer biology, cancer prevention and control protocols. Involvement of community-based pediatricians in the research mission of the COG is a high priority. Our performance in the current grant period has been strong evidenced by: a striking year-to-year increase in accrual to cancer prevention and control studies;steady increases in the number of available protocols;enhanced interactions between COG Disease, Discipline and other scientific committees resulting in more integrated cancer control protocol concepts;and active participation of CCOP investigators in COG operations. Cancer prevention and control accrual rose from 91 in 3/1/03-2/29/04 to 377 in 3/1/04-2/28/05 to 1,195 for the 3/1/05-2/1/06 period. In the 2004-2005 period, COG had 10 open cancer control protocols, this increased to 18 protocols in 2005-2006. Cancer prevention and control research is coordinated by the COG Cancer Control Committee which has identified the following priority areas: permanent treatment-related disabilities;nutrition, obesity/energy balance;acute symptoms/complications of treatment;end-of life/palliative care;and patient-reported outcomes. The CCOP Subcommittee promotes the design and conduct of pediatric cancer control research as well as supports CCOP member institutions and investigators in both local and Group-wide affairs. CCOPs provide an important mechanism to evaluate advanced treatments administered in community settings and broaden the population-base for protocol participation.
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