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From left to right: Rich Monopoli and Diane Legg, Co-Directors New England Chapter of Lung Cancer Alliance; Jason Wolfe, Vice President of Programming at WEEI Sports Radio, Boston; Heather Unruh, Co-Anchor at WCVB-TV Channel 5 in Boston.

The Global Lung Cancer Coalition (GLCC) Journalism Award recognizes outstanding journalistic efforts in providing lung cancer patients with a voice and promoting public understanding of the disease. This year, on November 13, at the Boston Shine a Light on Lung Cancer Vigil, Boston-based Sports Radio WEEI 93.7 was honored with the award for the station’s coverage of lung cancer during the Jimmy Fund Radio–Telethon. The telethon included interviews with survivors, oncologists and medical experts who provided insight into the burden of this disease and inspired lung cancer patients and their families with hope.

The GLCC is an international coalition that works on a global scale to ensure access to quality prevention and treatment for lung cancer patients, reduce the stigma of the disease and empower patients and their families to be their own health advocates. The four U.S. based organizations of the GLCC – The National Lung Cancer Partnership, Prevent Cancer Foundation, Lung Cancer Alliance and CancerCare – selected the winner for the 2012 U.S. Journalism Award.

Lung Cancer Alliance was asked to help lead the “policy perspective” discussion among this diverse group of medical, academic, industry and public health experts.

We began with an overview of the exciting convergence of events taking place for the lung cancer community. These include the scientific validation that screening people at high risk with low-dose computed tomography (CT) scans can reduce lung cancer mortality even more significantly and with far greater impact than other cancer screening methods such as mammograms or prostate specific antigen (PSA) testing. Estimates suggest that over 70,000 lives a year could be saved if we screened those at high risk today.

In addition to the science, we noted the recent launch of Lung Cancer Alliance’s National Framework for Lung Cancer Screening Excellence and Continuum of Care — a blue print that informs those at risk of their rights and outlines best practice guidelines for sites offering lung screening and care.  This National Framework has been adopted by close to 100 medical centers to date and showcases responsible, safe and cost-effective methods of standardized care.

We also noted the recent actuarial analysis conducted by Milliman which   documents that CT scans can save more lives, and at a lower cost than commonly used screening methods for other cancers.

Finally, we highlighted the growing support for first ever legislation calling for a more compassionate, coordinated and comprehensive plan of action to address all aspects of lung cancer. The legislation has strong bi-partisan backing and has been introduced in both House of Representatives and United States Senate. This legislation has also spawned a national network of political and grassroots activism that has firmly established a national movement for lung cancer awareness.

All participants agreed that these events – linked together — have the potential of realizing the greatest life-saving, cost benefiting, cancer mortality reducing opportunity ever – because they are focused on the leading cause of cancer death – lung cancer.

We discussed the challenges of engaging key government agencies responsible for screening related programs and considered next step strategies for expediting their reviews and activities. We discussed other public and private stakeholder interests and how best to reach key decision makers who could take swift action to implement screening and research related initiatives.  We considered historical contexts of other cancer screenings and applied “lessons learned” to the case of lung cancer screening.  Strategies were developed and assignments made.

All agreed – we have a big task ahead as we work to translate the science of lung cancer screening into public health benefit.  But no one was deterred either – rather all showed an even greater level of commitment to accomplish the important life-saving task at hand. So stay tuned – the best is yet to come!

And a big thank you to Prevent Cancer Foundation for its continued leadership an support to the entire cancer community!

Since spiral CT can detect early-stage lung cancer, cancer-related death could be reduced 20 percent if people at high risk received three annual screenings. Catching cancer in its early stages would result in earlier and lower treatment costs as well as a lower mortality rate.

Read the full News-Medical.net article.

Many public places have laws against smoking in public, such as bars and schools. However, research has shown that secondhand smoke from inside cars can be just as dangerous if not more dangerous than smoke-filled public places. Even if the car window is open, exposure to secondhand smoke has been linked to breathing problems and allergy symptoms.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) urges parents to ban smoking in their homes and cars.

Read the full USA Today article.

The particle improves on current cancer treatments because it can deliver drugs directly to tumor cells, avoiding any damage to healthy cells. The particle is able to release the drug by laser activation avoiding more invasive procedures.

Zhang said her research was partially motivated by her family’s loss of her grandfather and great grandfather to lung and liver cancer respectively.

Read the full article at The Washington Post.
Teen from California takes home $100K science prize for research on cancer stem cells

However, more so now than perhaps at any other time in recent memory, we have an opportunity to capitalize on advances in screening, a shifting attitude towards tobacco use and access to preventive services, to begin to impact this high mortality through policy change.

Policy makers at Federal, state and local levels have begun to understand the value of prevention and early diagnosis in lung cancer.  The Federal government has put stricter regulations on tobacco product manufacturers in place, and state and local governments have begun restricting the use of tobacco products in public places.  Public and private employers also recognize the value of providing access to cessation programs to help keep their workforce healthier.

But not all cases of lung cancer are caused by tobacco use. Nearly 20 percent of lung cancer patients have never smoked. And another factor contributing to high mortality is that only 16 percent of lung cancer is being diagnosed at an early stage.

Legislation introduced in Congress, the Lung Cancer Mortality Reduction Act S. 752/HR 1394, will help address the needs in lung cancer research and access to new screening technology. The bill calls for a coordinated approach across government to address the high mortality in lung cancer, increased research dollars for lung cancer specifically and development of better screening and early detection technology and standards.

Advancing this legislation will be a priority for the Prevent Cancer Foundation.  To learn more about how to become engaged in advocacy for cancer prevention, visit our advocacy page.

Lung Cancer may want a return to the days of smoke-filled restaurants and office buildings, but you have the power to make the future smoke-free by not smoking or if you do smoke, by quitting. You can also encourage loved ones to do the same. Let’s not turn back the clock, as lung cancer wants to do in the video, but look forward to saving lives through cancer prevention and early detection.

We welcome your comments on this PSA series and want to know what you think about cancer prevention and early detection. In case you missed them, check out “Out of Work” featuring all the preventable cancers and “Self Examination” focused on breast cancer. The long form PSA, “Preventable Cancer Support Group” is also available for you to watch and share.