CPCRN WORKGROUP & INTEREST GROUP PROJECTS

The CPCRN Scholars Workgroup strives to educate students, postdoctoral fellows, junior faculty, practitioners, and other health professionals in dissemination and implementation (D&I) science focused on cancer prevention and control and health equity. Scholars will be provided with opportunities to engage in mentored projects with workgroups that most align with their interests. Scholars will have different tracks to follow, but an educational component covering core competencies is required. Through a formalized process, it is our hope that we can increase: the depth and breadth of the Scholars’ connectedness within the CPCRN, a diverse cancer research pipeline, and applied D&I work in academic and clinical settings. Workgroup products are a D&I curriculum, evaluation of curricula, and Scholars’ productivity after the training.

Please contact Project Director, Courtney Petagna (cpetagn@emory.edu), for more information.

The goal of the CPCRN Health Behaviors Workgroup is to examine and characterize the complex relationships among social, structural, and commercial determinants of health, individual characteristics and experiences, and cancer outcomes, including survivorship and mortality. The primary objective of the Workgroup is to advance what is known about how determinants interact to influence cancer-related outcomes and disparities, and provide information that can be used by researchers and public health practitioners to inform the design of strategies and interventions intended to mitigate the health impacts of cancer.

For more information about the Health Behaviors Workgroup, please contact Project Chair, Dr. Ciaran Fairman (cfairman@mailbox.sc.edu).

Implementing evidence-based interventions (EBIs) often requires multi-level strategies. For example, efforts to increase CRC screening rates may require increasing access for patients, encouraging providers to recommend screening, and making screening a priority within healthcare organizations. Despite the importance of multi-level strategies, most research to promote EBI implementation to date has focused on individual-level determinants, which is reinforced by the availability of numerous behavior change theories and the Theoretical Domains Framework, which synthesizes these theories into a comprehensive list of individual determinants of implementation. In contrast, a framework that synthesizes organizational theories is lacking, thus, limiting awareness of organizational determinants of EBI implementation. The goal of this Workgroup is to advance the science of implementation by developing a theoretical framework of EBI implementation determinants derived from organization theories.

For more information about the OTIS Workgroup, please contact Project Coordinator, Alexandra Peluso (apeluso@wakehealth.edu).

Research has shown that rural communities in the United States are often at increased risk of cancer incidence, morbidity, and mortality compared to their urban counterparts. Similarly, declines in the overall cancer burden seen nationally have not yet been observed in rural communities. The primary objective of the CPCRN Rural Cancer Workgroup is to leverage the resources, expertise, and relationships of the diverse CPCRN to conduct impactful and innovative rural cancer research to improve outcomes for rural residents and capacity for rural health care providers/organizations.

For more information about the Rural Cancer Workgroup, please contact Project Director, Heidi Haines (heidi-haines@uiowa.edu).

The CPCRN Cancer Survivorship Workgroup seeks to advance interdisciplinary research collaborations that support cancer survivorship science and outreach with the goal of promoting  health equity among cancer survivors. Workgroup members define a cancer survivors and survivorship as follows: An individual is considered a cancer survivor from the time of diagnosis, through the balance of their life. This also includes secondary survivors, such as caregivers and family members of those diagnosed with cancer. Survivorship research encompasses the physical, psychological, social, economic and spiritual health of survivors across the cancer continuum, with special emphasis on long-term well-being, including disease prevention and health promotion over the life course.

Numerous gaps remain in Workgroup members' effort to optimize the health of all cancer survivors. Further, there are several underserved and/or vulnerable groups of survivors whose unique needs for health promotion after a diagnosis are not being met. This Workgroup is charged with filling gaps in current knowledge and advancing the evidence base to cancer survivorship care as well as conducting dissemination and implementation (D&I) research, engaging in policy, and supporting clinical guidelines to promote health after a cancer diagnosis.

For more information about the Cancer Survivorship Workgroup, please contact Workgroup co-chair Karen Wickersham at kwickers@mailbox.sc.edu

The CPCRN Health Equity Workgroup (previously Health Equity & Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) Interest Group) advances health equity in cancer prevention and control research and provides the CPCRN and Network Centers with: guiding principles for health and racial equity; tools for measurement and evaluation of health and racial equity principles; case studies intended to serve as examples of the equity principles in action and guidance around implementing them; and technical assistance to support the integration of health and racial equity into research.

The CPCRN LGBTQ+ Interest Group is a population-based project, established in April 2023 (CPCRN5 Year 4),  focused on LGBTQ+ communities with cancer. The objective of the LGBTQ+ workgroup is to advance the science and address the unique needs and challenges of LGBTQ+ populations within the context of cancer prevention and control. We aim to capitalize on the expertise of the CPCRN through collaborative efforts, innovative research methodologies, and inclusive approaches to LGBTQ+ equity

For more information about the LGBTQ+ Workgroup, please contact Project Director, Amy Tran (amy_tran@unc.edu).

The overall objective of the Modeling Evidence-Based Intervention (EBI) Impact Workgroup is to inform the implementation of EBIs through modeling, systems mapping, and other systems science tools, including how to select and prioritize EBIs, appropriately plan for implementation, costs, and allocation of resources, and adapt EBIs for specific contexts. Workgroup members are interested in supporting increased cancer screening overall, as well as addressing observed disparities. In order to guide cancer screening-focused intervention planning, practice-level change, improvement at the health system-level, and policy at the state and national level, members integrate best available evidence into decision support models, which they use to conduct virtual comparative and cost effectiveness research. Using EBI models, they simulate and compare the impact of alternate “what if” scenarios on screening rates in a given year and over time, the percent of subpopulations up-to-date with routine screening, cancer incidence, cancer stage at diagnosis, and cancer deaths and/or life-years lost due to cancer. Workgroup members engage diverse stakeholders in discussions regarding the appropriate outcomes of focus, motivating research questions, target populations, and resource considerations. The Workgroup also aims to serve as a resource for others interested in applying a systems lens to their research and implementation studies (for example, by providing guidance on how to conduct simulation studies and systems mapping activities, and use the findings to improve cancer screening).

For more information about the Modeling EBI Impact Workgroup, please contact Project Chair, Dr. Stephanie Wheeler (stephanie_wheeler@unc.edu).

The Multiple Cancer Screening Workgroup grew out of the question:  how can we make cancer preventive services easier for people to access and use? Thus we are looking at a cancer screening(s) paired with any kind of preventive service, be it gynecologic or flu vaccine, etc. Our Workgroup has been focused on a conducting a scoping review to answer the research question, ‘What is the structure, content, and impact of bundled cancer screening programs?’