The Feist-Weiller Cancer Center (FWCC) Minority-Based Community Clinical Oncology Program (MB-CCOP) aims to provide increased access to state-of-the-art cancer prevention care, and control through NCI-sponsored clinical trials to the minority and indigent populations in the northwestern section of La., and throughout the state of Louisiana. The Feist-Weiller Cancer Center was established at the Louisiana State University Health Science Center in Shreveport (LSUHSC-S) to provide multidisciplinary cancer care, and clinical and translational research targeted to the unique population in Northwest La, which will improve the public health by decreasing cancer incidence and deaths. The population was plagued with high rates of poverty, low literacy and low levels of education, little access to modern approaches to prevention, detection, and treatment of cancer, and often presented with late stages of cancer, Fifty-five percent of newly diagnosed cancer patients at LSUHSC-S are African-Americans, With the destruction of Charity and University Hospitals in New Orleans by hurricane Katrina, LSUHSCS is now the only intact tertiary care hospital providing care to the state's indigent population and has become the major site for treatment of patients with leukemia and lymphoma, and those requiring bone marrow transplant. To provide local access to cancer clinical trials for the increased referral area, the FWCC will continue to strengthen and expand its organizational and operational base in order to support a structure to effectively implement a program to provide a multidisciplinary approach to cancer care and prevention for patients referred to the FWCC and in the patients'local communities. The FWCC MB-CCOP has provided access to NCI-sponsored clinical trials and research coordinator support at outlying sites. Education will be provided to community physicians through teleconferencing cancer tumor boards. Outreach programs to educate the indigent and minority population about cancer prevention, screening, and treatment, and clinical trials available through the FWCC MB-CCOP will be conducted with the assistance of the Louisiana Cancer Control Partnership, an organization dedicated to reducing cancer disparities by providing education, screening, referrals, information dissemination, and other resources in the minority and underserved communities. As well, the FWCC Partners in Wellness Free cancer screening program will be utilized to spread this valuable educational information. Since the FWCC has been founded, our approach to cancer has resulted in outcomes at LSUHSC-S at least as good as the national average and far better than Louisiana as a whole which ranks 49th in cancer mortality. The FWCC has a history of greater than 40% minority accrual to SWOG, CTSU, and NCI treatment and prevention studies, as well as industry, in-house, and translational research protocols. Plans to expand minority access and accrual are detailed in this application.
The provision of a multidisciplinary cancer care program to a population plagued by poverty, illiteracy, and little access to innovative approaches to the prevention, detection and treatment of cancer will serve to educate and treat this population, thereby decreasing cancer incidence and deaths.
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