Cancer Curricular Advances for Research and Education (Cancer CARE)

A well-prepared health workforce is essential to conducting cancer research that serves all individuals affected by or at risk for cancer regardless of their background as they seek comprehensive cancer care, including prevention, screening, treatment, and survivorship support. Research on Americans has revealed significant differences in cancer outcomes across groups. Individuals with multiple risk-related characteristics often face greater exposure to cancer risk factors, are more susceptible to certain cancer types, and tend to experience poorer outcomes. These individuals have a variety of backgrounds and experiences, resulting in complex and heterogeneous care needs. As a result, they are often understudied and challenged in accessing care. While research focused on these populations continues to grow, gaps persist in our knowledge of cancer risk and cancer treatment experiences. These critical gaps must be addressed to develop evidence-based interventions that optimize oncology care across the entire cancer care continuum—from prevention to survivorship. As no nationally available resource routinely trains and prepares the oncology and biomedical workforce for such cancer research, our short-term goal is to promote and annually offer a foundational curriculum that prepares and orients early-career and junior investigators for conducting cancer research and fosters fruitful collaborations. The curriculum has been designed by a multidisciplinary, multi-institutional project team and expert advisory committee that bring national perspective and experience with understudied and access-challenged populations and in-depth knowledge across key areas, including cancer research, clinical care, curriculum development, education, and health care advocacy.

Specific Aims: (1) Offer the course annually to 30 early-career investigators recruited nationally from a broad audience of professionals interested in cancer research across the cancer continuum and relevant to understudied and access-challenged groups; (2) Facilitate their professional development and research success by providing orientation and post-workshop seminars to complement the course. These sessions will focus on new topics in under-researched areas of cancer, as well as provide participants with exposure to potential cancer research mentors and career development guidance; and (3) Maximize the efficacy of the course by evaluating and updating curricular enhancements and teaching innovations for multimodal dissemination. Core modules include clinical cancer research; behavioral sciences and interventions; epidemiology and population-level research; community based participatory approaches for cancer research; and data collection and using digital tools and platforms. This course design will be adaptable for in-person modality, blended learning, as well as online-only formats in response to the research and education restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic. The long-term goal of the course is to increase the number of professionals able to lead and advocate for research to reduce cancer disparities and to advance health for all Americans at risk for and suffering from cancer.

Grant Number: 5R25CA265802-04
NIH Institute/Center: NIH
Principal Investigator: Shine Chang