The Data, Evaluation, and Coordination Center (DECC) for Connecting Underrepresented Populations to Clinical Trials (CUSP2CT)

Despite the decline in overall mortality and incidence of cancer in the US population, the burden of cancer care is still high. One key barrier experienced by those that have high burden of cancer is the lack of dedicated efforts employing scientifically rigorous approaches and implementation strategies for the enrollment in and accrual of participants in clinical trials. The Connecting Patient Populations to Clinical Trials (CP2CT) program aims to implement and evaluate multilevel outreach and education interventions that will increase the accrual of participants in clinical trials. To support the program, we are proposing to be the Data, Evaluation, and Coordination Center (DECC) to support the data and evaluation activities and coordinate a learning collaborative towards mitigating the key barriers of participating in clinical trials. Specifically, we will collaborate with the U01 program investigators and interact with involved NCI staff members and with other stakeholders, as needed, to carry out the following activities: 1) establish effective and efficient administrative processes and infrastructure through scientific leadership, organizational processes, governance structure, effective oversight and operational procedures to achieve optimal communication, collaboration, coordination, and dissemination of research, 2) facilitate and coordinate data collection and management across the program to facilitate evidence generation and rapid dissemination of methods and tools, 3) organize and facilitate collaborative efforts on program evaluation, engagement, and communication, and 4) foster a learning collaborative in leading and coordinating research across the program. We are uniquely positioned to be the DECC by leveraging our strong track record in: (i) implementing cancer research centers and consortia (e.g. Dr. Odedina is MPI on NCI CRCHD U54 CaRE2 Center and contact MPI for a newly awarded Department of Defense iCCaRE Consortium); (ii) leading statistics and data management coordinating center effort in cancer trials (e.g., Mayo is the Statistics and Data Management Center of the Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology (Alliance) including both interventional and NCORP grants); (ii) leading standardization and interoperability for practice and research (e.g., Mayo has been contributing to the NCI Terminology Service Development Effort and part of the data harmonization efforts in the NCATS Clinical Data to Health (CD2H)). Additionally, we have strong institutional priorities aligning with the program’s existing infrastructure and resources supporting the program’s mission.