The Bay Area Tumor Institute, an NCI funded CCOP since 1987, has developed a comprehensive and collaborative community-wide system to reduce cancer morbidity and mortality among children and adults by improving cancer care in Oakland, California, and its nearby communities, where 72% of the population belongs to minority groups. The mission to serve this poor and under served community is accomplished through the development of community-based programs in therapeutic clinical research, prevention research, medical and nursing education, patient consultation, patient education, and public information. The Institute also collects and distributes fresh human tissue via the Cooperative Human Tissue Network. This application seeks to improve the interchange of medical information between its constituents and national and international health agencies. The Bay Area Tumor Institute intends to build on the Institute?s existing programs and accomplishments by offering and providing Internet access to the community physicians, oncology nurses, oncology social workers, cancer patients, and their family members, and general public who already look to the Institute as the principal local source of information and support for cancer research, education, and consultation in Oakland, California, and its surrounding communities. The specific benefits of this project will be the rapid interchange of medical information to: 1. Improve the clinical care of cancer patients. 2. Increase patient accrual to NCI-funded therapeutic clinical trials and cancer prevention trials. 3. Improve the administration of and data collection for NCI-funded therapeutic clinical trials and cancer prevention trials. 4. Facilitate transfer of files and images between the Institute and national medical agencies and databases. 5. Increase the volume of tissue collected for the Cooperative Human Tissue Network and its cancer research programs. 6. Provide opportunities for community-based physicians who lack Internet capabilities to employ the Bay Area Tumor Institute to search medical data bases on their behalf. 7. Increase the access to medical education information and research for all of the Institute?s various constituencies.
