McMinnville Parks and Recreation will hold its Lunch and Learn for July at McMinnville Civic Center on Thursday at noon. The featured topic is cancer prevention, detection and research.
The guest speaker will be Cancer Support Program director Kim Parham for Saint Thomas Health. Parham oversees all cancer support programs within the hospital, which includes outreach, nurse and patient navigation, as well as integrative medicine.
“I would like to stress the importance of screenings and what is recommended for women and men of different ages,” said Parham. “For example, the National Comprehensive Cancer Network recently recommended low-dose CT screenings for high-risk patients. There is a lot of preventative and diagnostic information out there. I hope to be able to break that down for the group and make it a little easier to understand.”
Parham adds, “I would also like to talk a little about cancer risk services and emphasize that, in addition to breast and ovarian cancers, there are other family history clusters that we can provide genetic testing for.”
Another guest will be Sandy Carr, Health Initiatives representative for the American Cancer Society. Carr will provide information about the society’s upcoming Cancer Prevention Study – 3 (CPS-3), which is a nationwide study open to men and women between the ages of 30 and 65 who have no personal history of cancer.
On Aug. 16, Warren County will hold a meeting for the study at the Warren County Chamber of Commerce from 7:30 to 11 a.m. and from 2 to 5:30 p.m. Participants will give their consent for the study, complete a brief written survey, provide some physical measurements, and then give a small blood sample.
The initial study will be the beginning of a much larger study. On Aug. 16, participants will be given a longer, more comprehensive survey to take home and complete. Then, over the next 20-30 years, participants will be asked to complete short mail-in surveys every two to three years to keep the society updated on lifestyle and health changes.
The goal is to recruit at least 300,000 individuals from various racial/ ethnic backgrounds to participate in the long-term study, which will help provide a better understanding of how lifestyle, genetics and the environment affect cancer and how we can better prevent the disease.
Lunch and Learn session are free and open to the public, so bring a lunch and enjoy the talk. Sessions covering a variety of topics are held quarterly at the Civic Center and are primarily sponsored by the city of McMinnville through Parks and Recreation. For more information, call Kristie Sanders at 473-1212.
For more information about the cancer study, visit www.CPS3UpperCumberland.org.