FAQ
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What's the purpose of the CCRC?
Our new Center is set up to study new ways to communicate about
cancer, both between patients and healthcare providers, and the
sorts of communication that providers have together, for
patients.
Your thoughts
What's the quickest way to communicate my
research?
Sometimes in dissemination, quickest isn't best. Specialty media
and mass media are quickest for reaching a lot of people, but they
typically have little impact on individuals unless the messages are
repeated many times and, ideally, reinforced through other means,
too, like people talking with each other.
Your Thoughts
Who can I talk to with a question?
Good question! For questions about dissemination research, contact
our research associate, Borsika
Rabin. For questions about organizational change, contact Jim Dearing. Questions about the
Center itself can go to Sarah
Madrid.
Has this Center been operating long?
The CCRC is heading into its fifth year and is still
growing.
Why should I be interested in dissemination or
implementation research?
A very good question. Many policymakers and researchers now
recognize that while in the U.S. we have funded a great deal of
basic research, most of it never ends up being used, let alone
improving something like health or healthcare. Dissemination and
implementation research sort of picks up where traditional research
ends, by improving how research results are communicated and put to
use.
Your Thoughts
Are you only funded by NCI?
Most of our funding is through the CECCR Initiative of NCI,
however, we have also received funding from the National Coalition
of Cancer Survivors.
Your Thoughts
I'm a primary care doc and I think we have many of the same
problems with communication that oncologists do. What can we do
today to improve the way we communicate with
patients?
Provider training, even just staff discussions together to
highlight potential problems, can lead to a shared understanding of
problems or opportunities for improvement. We've seen a number of
practice-based initiatives using LEAN and other methodologies
improve care coordination, communication, and patient hand-offs. It
can also be very instructive - providing a teachable moment - to
bring in a group of your patients for their perspectives and
feedback about your department's practices, especially if such
meetings are facilitated by someone from outside your unit.
Your Thoughts
How is your CECCR different from the other
CECCRs?
Our Center focuses on how organizational processes in healthcare
systems affect what goes on in conversations with patients. The other CECCRs have other
emphases.
Your Thoughts
I'm a grad student and I want to make sure that my
research helps the people I'm studying and others, too. Can you
help me do this?
Yes. See the tools
section of this website. We list lots of checklists, guidelines,
and quizzes to
help you design your research so that it will benefit people other
than just researchers.
Your thoughts
Are the tools that you're using to communicate about cancer
effective for other topics, too?
Many times, yes. In fact, most of the tools on this website were
developed for use with other topics such as encouraging people to
recycle, monitoring diabetes, and HIV prevention.
Your thoughts
Do you fund research?
Yes, we fund pilot studies about effective communication and about
care coordination within Cancer Research Network institutions. For
many other funding opportunities see our funding
page.
Are you part of Kaiser?
Yes, we're part of the Institute for Health Research in Kaiser
Permanente Colorado. But we're more than a Kaiser research center.
We bridge 15 healthcare organizations, all of which are members of
the Cancer Research Network. Come see us
in Denver!
Your thoughts
What types of researchers work in your
Center?
Behavioral researchers with degrees in psychology, sociology,
communication, and education; public health and health services
researchers; researchers who study organizations; health
economists; and doctors who also study clinical processes.
Your thoughts
Is there anything special about the study of cancer
communication?
Cancer does present many emotional and important decisions for
people, and it's often unexpected. So talking about it can be
difficult or incomplete, even hurtful. Cancer can also last for a
very long time, with different types of communication important to
the patient as time goes by.
Your thoughts
Do you do research about new technologies?
Yes, but other CECCR centers do more of this than we do. We do
study how the people who provide healthcare use communication
technologies, and how that use affects other aspects of office
work. So ours is a sociotechnical focus, not just a technical
focus.
Your thoughts
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