Education Network To Advance Cancer Clinical Trials

Programs: Community training "hosted a free, live interactive web-based community ambassador training program for 20 research teams. The community ambassador training program trains community leaders to raise awareness and increasing understanding of clinical trials in their community. The interactive core content is designed to be locally focused and culturally tailored, training ambassadors to lead information presentations about the importance of cancer research, encouraging inquiry about trials and "spreading the word. This peer-to-peer approach allows for an open and honest dialogue about clinical research. Health care provider training "developed a patient discussion guide for boston medical center. The guide is intended to assist navigators in discussing potential trial participation in the clinic setting. Bmc use of the guide is pending. "completed promotion and monitoring of cme-accredited online training developed in collaboration with the center for asian health. The course was designed for primary care providers serving asian patients to increase their knowledge of cancer clinical trials, encourage discussion with patients about trials, and refer patients to cancer care sites that offer trials. Programs "planned and completed the national cancer clinical trials collaborative learning network, a patient-centered quality improvement program to improve cancer clinical trial recruitment, accrual and retention. The learning network provided 19 research teams - from both community oncology practices and academic center - with tools and techniques to identify and capitalize on specific opportunities for improvement to expand accrual and increase efficiency. Utilizing lessons learned and feedback from the original pilot learning collaborative, enacct showed the feasibility of using the model for research teams to effectively evaluate and review their current procedures for gaps and leaks. "continued hosting a free, monthly policy webinar series which aimed to raise awareness and enhance understanding of significant policy issues impacting cancer clinical trial accrual. Through this series, enacct was able to continue its advocacy for system changes to facilitate all cancer patients being screened for available trials, all trial eligible patients being approached by the oncologist and all trial eligible patients interested in participation being successfully enrolled. A total of 12 webinars were completed, averaging nearly 300 registrants and each receiving very positive feedback. "implemented patient navigation in cancer clinical trials, a pilot demonstration program designed to promote patient self-advocacy, question- listing and communication about potential research participation in the clinical trial setting. With input from a national advisory committee, the pilot selected 2 performance sites, with each institution implementing the intervention and monitoring trial accrual over a six month period. Development "developed the 360 cancer trial accrual self-assessment tool. This tool is designed to help community cancer centers and networks evaluate and improve their own cancer clinical trials accrual using 7 critical dimensions. The 7 dimensions include: (1) mission, strategy and vision, (2) trial selection and initiation, (3) people and tools, (4) accrual processes and procedures, (5) finance and management, (6) community outreach, and (7) communication practices. This tool is designed as a guided analysis which can be completed online, ideally by the cancer research leadership team with data provided by the staff. It is designed to focus the attention of the leadership team on both qualitative and quantitative factors across the critical dimensions of an effective clinical trials process. The tool includes three elements: (1) excel based data collection tool allowing for easy compilation and evaluation of all data needed to complete the assessment, (2) a web-based assessment survey intended to be completed by the research leadership team, and (3) the quick 360 survey which consists of a subset of questions from the web-based assessment survey and is intended to be completed by accruing physicians and research staff not involved in completing the web-based assessment. This tool was tested among 19 research teams. 100% of the teams found the process of completing the self-assessment to be very or somewhat helpful, and 92% found the results to be very or somewhat helpful in strategically identifying areas for improvement in their processes. "competencies for clinical trial accrual professionals. Following extensive review of existing professional standards for individuals that work in the cancer research setting, enacct identified a set of key competencies, categorized according to seven core domains that are deemed essential for personnel to have in order to effectively identify, approach, enroll and retain patients onto cancer clinical trials. Clinical trial staff training "enacct completed open to options plus, a training initiative for oncology professionals in collaboration with the cancer support community. Eighty- four health professionals trained across 4 csc training sites. Following training, significant improvement were observed in 8 out of 17 knowledge areas. Among respondents at post (n=76), 50% were very likely and 43% somewhat likely to make changes in recruitment and retention practices as a result of training. Among respondents 3 months post-training, (n=21), 60% had decided to work within their organization on changes to strengthen trials recruitment, retention and communication practices