Although the Central Illinois CCOP is only in its third year of funded operation, we have already achieved several of our initial aims, including: establishing a functional consortium of leading institutions in Central Illinois, dedicated to a cancer care system and committed to providing resources to assure its success and stability; maintaining a joint cancer data system that consolidates registry and patterns of care information from the participating institutions; and solidifying cancer research resources, centralizing data management support to clinical investigators at participating hospitals. The achievement of these initial aims has allowed us to initiate a series of new aims: to develop and implement a program of cancer control research that assures the CCOP will meet and exceed NCI requirements for cancer control accrual; to involve cancer specialists from participating institutions in a variety of activities that provide a common experience and strengthen each of the participating institutions; to set a pace for protocol accrual that meets and exceeds the standard for comparable CCOPs; to maintain quality control procedures, physician participation policies, pharmaceutical policies and protocol selection policies at the highest possible levels. Several important features of the CICCOP have made it possible for the organization to quickly become a preeminent member of the CCOP network. The principal investigator has demonstrated remarkable leadership ability, which enabled CICCOP to rapidly implement a strong multi-institutional research program that has both exceptional levels of quality control and solid accruals. We have demonstrated a significant ability to accrue patients to therapeutic clinical trials and in Year Two of NCI funding accrued 105 patients to clinical trials while still maintaining quality data collection. CICCOP's ability to accrue patients to cancer control protocols is also outstanding, and we have accrued 88 patients to cancer control protocols this year. High levels of community financial support have also contributed to our success. Our high standards of achievement have been recognized by our research bases, and CICCOP is considered to be a """"""""superior performer"""""""". Central Illinois Community Clinical Oncology Program offers the NCI a unique history of past performance and a promise of continued achievements.
Showing the most recent 10 out of 59 publications
