Healthy Communities: When Cancer Prevention Is the Target

The American Cancer Society’s Approach to Addressing Healthy Communities

Author:

Tracy Wiedt (Presenter)
American Cancer Society

Public Health Statement: Between 1990 and 2015 cancer death rates dropped 26%, mostly as a result of tobacco control efforts, increased rates of screening (i.e., colonoscopy, mammography), and advances in cancer treatment.[i] However, if we truly are to improve health and reduce pain and suffering from cancer, these cancer-related preventive services must be continued and must be augmented with community based approaches.

Purpose: The American Cancer Society is improving health by fostering cross-sector collaboration; creating healthier, more equitable communities; and strengthening the integration of health services and systems. Strategies such as community mobilization to address health eating and active living barriers in neighborhoods will be shared.

Methods/Approach: Communities participated were selected based upon their community having two or more large health systems, need, and strong leadership capacity within ACS, health systems and other partners interested in addressing healthy eating and active living. These communities used their community health needs assessments and other data to help inform and define their goals.

Results: The following results will be discussed: number of communities that participated and how selected, the goals they identified and how determined, the policy and systems strategies being used to improve health and how selected, and which sectors are involved.

Conclusions/Implications: Lessons from this experience will be shared so that other organizations pursuing healthy communities’ activities related to cancer can replicate in their communities.

Byers, T, Wender, R, Jemal, A, et al. The American Cancer Society Challenge Goal to Reduce U.S. Cancer Mortality by 50% Between 1990 and 2015: Results and Reflections. CA Cancer J Clin. 2016;66:359–69.

Health Communication: A Key Connector for Cancer Prevention

Authors:

Brad Love (Presenter)
University of Texas

Yen Chen, University of Texas

Public Health Statement: Health communication can make public health efforts more effective and efficient by informing and empowering groups. Communication improves prevention efforts by promoting screening, supporting survivorship, linking resources, and encouraging community voices.

Purpose: The purpose of this review is to understand and document best practices for communication campaigns in community cancer prevention.

Methods/Approach: The project team started with a scoping review to broadly gather published information about existing healthy community initiatives targeted at levels from the local to the national. Research publications reporting outcomes and also public-facing content such as news articles and digital media about community wellness efforts were all included. From the 100 initiatives studied, the team noted information about program outcomes and communication particulars to document data about effectiveness, strategic approaches, partners, communication channels, communication frequency, community details, and other important aspects such as cultural diversity, economic activity, and parkland infrastructure.

Results: Six elements of effective prevention campaigns stood out, including: 1) significant formative research to engage and understand community language; 2) linking existing resources; 3) empowering clinical providers to discuss prevention; 4) targeting multiple communication levels (e.g., family, mass media, social groups); 5) employing many partner avenues (e.g., schools, policy-makers, food suppliers); and 6) interim progress measurement.

Conclusions/Implications: Best practices common to effective healthy community efforts offer tactics for tailoring communication to different audiences that can help prevent cancer by promoting healthy behaviors, reducing health-reducing behaviors, increasing screening uptake, and fostering community cohesiveness and overall well-being.

Focusing Healthy Communities on Cancer Control

Authors:

Ruth Rechis (Presenter)
MD Anderson

Anna Brewster, MD Anderson
Katherine Oestman, MD Anderson
Elizabeth Caballero, MD Anderson

Public Health Statement: Up to 50 million lives could be saved each decade by implementing known, effective strategies for cancer prevention. The critical step is to identify and implement the most effective means of putting this knowledge into action at the community level.

Purpose: Healthy community approaches have yielded significant positive change in communities across the U.S. In advance of developing a novel healthy community focused on cancer, these approaches were reviewed to identify best practices and effective strategies for implementation.

Methods/Approach: The project team 1) established partnerships with existing local, state, and national healthy community initiatives; 2) analyzed community-based interventions that have been assessed for their scientific significance and 3) conducted a broad review on engaging communities in healthy living initiatives.

Results: Five components of successful approaches for implementing healthy community initiatives applied to cancer were identified. At the highest level these include: 1) Engage the local community to identify assets, needs, and solutions in advance of implementation; 2) Leverage schools as a large employer and central component of any community; 3) Deliver a health communication campaign; 4) Execute evidence-based interventions that can be implemented and sustained by the community; and 5) Develop an infrastructure for delivering and evaluating an integrated approach across multiple stakeholders. Additionally, approximately 100 strategies focused on cancer prevention and control were identified and will be shared.

Conclusions/Implications: Past healthy community approaches have a great deal to share with addressing community challenges in cancer prevention. Using this approach, could have a significant impact on addressing cancer prevention and control at the community level.

The Inaugural Healthy Communities Initiative Process

Authors:

Anna Brewster (Presenter)
MD Anderson Cancer Center

Ruth Rechis, MD Anderson Cancer Center
Elizabeth Caballero, MD Anderson Cancer Center
Katherine Oestman, MD Anderson Cancer Center

Public Health Statement: Foundational to eliminating cancer is preventing it from initially occurring, which requires a collaborative, community-based effort.

Purpose: The purpose of this initiative was to implement cancer prevention and control strategies in five high impact cancer prevention areas, collaboratively with residents.

Methods/Approach: After receiving significant support from a corporate partner, a community selection process was conducted, based on needs and available resources of communities near the corporate partner’s location. Baytown, Texas was selected for this project (population: 71,000). After selection, a community assessment was conducted to understand the current state of health, strengths of the community, and areas of need. Several individuals engaged in the assessment process were asked to represent the community’s interest on a Steering Committee. The Steering Committee was led through a consensus process to prioritize evidence-based strategies to improve diet and physical activity for cancer risk reduction. Based on the chosen strategies, interventions were modified based on the needs and capacity of the community. Collaborating organizations submitted work plans which were organized into a comprehensive community action plan.

Results: The Steering Committee approved the community action plan and subsequently funding was allocated to the collaborating organizations to carry out the interventions with MD Anderson as the backbone organization to support the work and provide cancer prevention expertise. In Baytown, nine organizations will carry out 18 interventions focused on diet and physical activity.

Conclusions/Implications: The Healthy Communities initiative has successfully yielded a resident-driven, cancer prevention, community action plan to be implemented over the next three years.