SCHEQ held our 2nd Lung Cancer Health Equity Summit Nov 18-19 in greater Atlanta at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine – Georgia (PCOM) in Suwanee, GA. The theme of this year’s summit was “Black and Hispanic Populations Navigating Lung Cancer: Stepping Stones to Equity.” This theme was chosen because we often hear about the challenges and disparities, but we never bring together stakeholders across the care continuum that have implemented solutions to the problems. These populations do not readily have information and resources available that reflects their lived experiences. We also wanted to lay the foundation for an annual event to build a network of individuals that are dedicated to addressing disparities for these communities. This means that we did not just want a patient event, a researcher event, or a clinician event, but an event that brings them all together to break down the silos.
In general, there were alternate panel discussions and session presentations that covered topics including patient experiences, screening, clinical trials, biomarkers, community engagement, menthol, and mentorship programs. We held breakout sessions and roundtables to collectively tackle pressing issues. Some takeaways from this year’s program include:
1. Diversity, participation, and sponsorship:
A priority for this program was that every session and panel had to have diverse representation and no manels. We achieved this goal on all of the sessions except for one, where one person was unable to attend. Registrations increased from 42 to 117, and they represented 21 states and 53 organizations. The two most represented states were Georgia (48), NY (10), and FL and MI (6 each). By broad category of registration, the two most represented groups were either trainees, nonprofits, government, or patient advocacy (35) or were allied health, faculty researcher, clinicians, or social workers (21). While 13.7% of registrants were patients, caregivers, or survivors (Figure 1), several attendees and speakers were survivors of other cancers or had family members with lung cancer. Additionally, we increased our exhibitors from 1 to 3 and we increased our funders from 1 to 6 (Genentech, BMS, AstraZeneca, Takeda, Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine, and Daiichi Sankyo).
2. Dynamic Keynote Presentations:
We had two phenomenal keynote speeches at the conference this year. Dr. Loretta Erhunmwunsee from the City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer gave the day 1 keynote. It was a thorough presentation on the role of structural and systemic racism in lung cancer disparities. She also touched on SDOH, stress, redlining, and environmental pollution in diverse and underserved communities. Dr. Estelamari Rodriguez from the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine gave they keynote on day 2. She discussed disparities in surgery, disparities in biomarker testing, and health inequities across the lung cancer care continuum. She also offered strategies to achieve health equity.
3. Patient Participation:
One of our major goals was to bring diverse patients, caregivers, and survivors into contact with researchers, clinicians, and other professionals. It was important to relay the experiences of patients in obtaining care and learn who is advocating for them, and for the professionals to learn approaches that they might be able to implement in their respective environments.
A patient and caregiver panel discussed their experiences in lung cancer care navigation. Patient advocate organizations had a session to discuss their missions and some of the services that they provide. Our panel on lung cancer stigma and nihilism had a caregiver and a survivor describe their experiences in lung cancer, the challenges with stigma and nihilism, the tobacco settlement money, and how they prefer to be identified in interactions with healthcare providers.
While this is not all of the organizations, we would like to thank the American Indian Cancer Foundation (AICAF), Chris Draft Family Foundation, the Cancer Survivorship Provider Network (CSPN), Citizens for Radioactive Radon Reduction (CR3), Health Data Advocacy, KRAS Kickers, Live Lung, Patient Advocate Foundation (PAF), White Ribbon Project, and LUNGevity for their contributions to the conference. We also want to thank the patients, caregivers, and survivors for sharing their stories and helping identify speakers.
4. Networking and Partnerships:
In order to impact change, we need to build the network of people working towards the same goal of improving outcomes. Through the breaks, breakout sessions, poster sessions, roundtables, and meals we fostered introductions and new partnerships. There was a lot of energy and enthusiasm in the room, and people felt inspired. Many noted that there were phenomenal speakers and are eager to participate in the summit in 2025. As a result of this meeting, we will be launching at least one working group and one webinar series starting in late January or in February of 2025.
Summary
This was the first full meeting that was completely planned, organized, and executed by SCHEQ. We thank the planning committee for all of their hard work. We had an engaged, diverse, and multi-stakeholder meeting that discussed solutions to addressing disparities for diverse groups. We also would like to give an immense thanks to PCOM and Dr. Price for hosting us, PCOM’s AV and catering team, and the Westin Atlanta Gwinnett for holding the Speaker’s Dinner. These were great locations with exceptional staff, and we learned many things that can be applied in aspects of our work. We look forward to seeing everyone at the 2025 Lung Cancer Health Equity Summit.
Eugene Manley, Jr. PhD. Is the Founder and CEO of the SCHEQ Foundation (STEMM & Cancer Health Equity) in New York City. Dr. Manley is a Mechanical Engineer, Biomedical Engineer, and Molecular and Cell Biologist that is dedicated to mentoring, health equity, workforce diversity, training programs, partnerships, and advocating for underserved and marginalized populations.
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