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Newark, NJ - Barcelona, Spain - On June 25 - 28, 2013 in New York City at NYU Kimmel Center for Student Life, The Prostate Net launched our CADRE Project initiative, a training program for patient advocates that enables them to build sustainable models of education, intervention, research and advocacy within their communities in order to mitigate the negative impacts of prostate cancer and other men's health co-morbidities.
The initial six advocates selected for this program came from regions with a disproportionate incidence and/or mortality from prostate cancer, were evaluated based on their current or previous advocacy efforts, and were trained to understand the etiology of prostate cancer from diagnosis to the advanced stages of the disease. They are returning to their communities in partnership with The Prostate Net to change the negative impact of prostate cancer. The synergy of the CADRE Project is the creation of team leaders who can coalesce their community's singular capabilities and provide a framework to execute initiatives that no one group could achieve alone.
Program Overview
A major aspect in the management of prostate cancer, and men's health deficiencies in general, has been three key impediments to achieving optimal patient care:
- Lack of interdisciplinary evaluation as a benchmark of patient-centered care
- Lack of evidence-based clinical management recommendations by initial patient staging or disease progression
- Disparate access to care, e.g. facilities, insufficiency of time with a physician, socio-economic barriers, etc.
Historic patient interventions have focused around support groups, educational meetings, brochures and newsletters, webinars, as well as telephone or web-based help lines. Emerging technologies have seen some elemental web interactivity, video communications and smart-phone applications to educate consumers and patients and to provide access to patient health information. The core deficiency is that there is a lack of focus on target audiences, vehicle implementation, resource capabilities and ability to engage the communities of patients, professionals and stakeholders.
There is a need for the creation of community-based leadership entities with broad skill sets, with a history of successful interventions, that can partner synergistically to effectively re-position the conversation on disease risk awareness, that can inform and educate the at-risk consumer population, that can create a necessary stakeholder network of on-going intervention, and can develop a sustainable model of patient advocacy in their communities.
The Edelman Trust Barometer reported that only 18% of the public worldwide trusted business leaders to tell them the truth. The public was more likely to believe non-governmental organizations (NGOs) than companies - even when the companies had a stronger argument.
The Prostate Net's CADRE Project is the first-in-principle prostate cancer patient advocate training initiative. This cadre will build effective partnerships with medical centers, public health agencies, research centers, complementary patient advocate organizations and corporations with investment in their local communities to significantly advance the fight against prostate cancer and other men's health issues.
(left to right) Anita Linton, CADRE Training Mentor; Bert Brown; Linda Johnson; Terry Kungel; Virgil Simons, Founder & President - The Prostate Net; Robert Young; Thomas Wallace; Joey Johnson
The CADRE Project was
supported in part by unrestricted educational grants from:
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