Updated September 7th, 2022

As SurvivorNet Holds Its ‘Close The Gap’ Conference, We’re Honoring National Black Family Cancer Awareness Week

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Close the Gap

National Black Family Cancer Awareness Week takes place this week.
This initiative aims to promote diversity in cancer clinical trial participation and encourage minority population specimen donations to national genomic databases for cancer research.
Clinical trial information serves as the basis for government approval of cancer drugs. Unfortunately, these trials can be lacking in diversity, which means that the approvals may not accurately reflect what is best for racial minorities with cancer.
SurvivorNet is committed to addressing racial disparities within the world of cancer care. We held our annual Close The Gap online video conference on June 23, 2022.
Our Close The Gap conference sought to raise awareness of and address solutions to racial disparities in cancer care.
You can watch the big event here.

In light of National Black Family Cancer Awareness Week, SurvivorNet is trying to “Close the Gap” on racial disparities within the world of cancer care.

The purpose of National Black Family Cancer Awareness Week is multifaceted. On one hand, this initiative is looking to bring cancer awareness to a vulnerable segment of the United States population. On the other hand, this week is meant to foster action by “[marshaling] community-based stakeholders to build knowledge surrounding cancer clinical trial participation and minority population specimen donations to national genomic databases for cancer research.” In other words, this campaign is all about education around these serious issues and getting minority populations involved with cancer research efforts.

It’s a unfortunate statistic that Black Americans have the highest cancer death rates and shortest survival times of any racial or ethnic group in this country. A Black woman who gets breast cancer in America has a 39 percent higher chance of dying than a white woman. African-American men with prostate cancer are almost twice as likely to die from their illness than white men with the same disease, and African Americans have more than twice the incidence rate of multiple myeloma compared to white Americans.

Mistrust and Racial Disparities within the Medical World

Socioeconomic disparities, a lack of access to health care services and poor or no insurance have led to troubling racial disparities within cancer care. In order to solve these issues of racial disparities, the medical world needs to earn the trust of communities of color.

But trust, as we all know, is hard-earned and easy to lose. And mistrust of the medical world by communities of color can unfortunately exist.

Take the Tuskegee syphilis experiment, for example. Otherwise known as the "Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male," this not-so-distant 'study' ran from 1932 and only ended 40 years later with more than 600 African-American men in Alabama enrolled by the then-U.S. Health Service. The tragedy was that these men were never told what the study was truly about or given proper treatment to cure the disease.

How the Medical World Can Regain the Trust of Communities of Color

Not much time has passed, but earning that trust is essential to combating the disparities that exist for minorities when it comes to cancer care. Clinical trial participation, for example, depends on it.

The FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research's (CDER's) Drug Trials Snapshots Summary Report for 2021 illustrates the scope of this issue very well. In 2021, the CDER approved 15 novel therapies to treat a variety of cancers, but the majority of patients were White (72-95%) across al 15 novel approvals with exception for two programs. Blacks and Hispanic enrollment across the programs ranged from 1-10% with the exception of the Rylaze drug program, which enrolled 34% Hispanic/Latinos.

More diversity is needed because these trials serve as the basis for government approval of cancer drugs, and the approvals may not accurately reflect what is best for racial minorities with cancer when these trials lack diversity.

SurvivorNet’s Commitment to ‘Close the Gap’

In an effort to be part of the solution, SurvivorNet is holding our annual Close the Gap online video conference in collaboration with Perlmutter Cancer Center at NYU Langone Health. The event will be held on Thursday, June 23 at 1 p.m., and serve as a way to not only create space for necessary conversations, but to also offer creative solutions for the issues of equality, diversity and inclusion in cancer prevention, screening and care.

The event will include panel discussions with cancer survivors, leading doctors, hospital leaders, community organizers and industry executives as well as special performances by singer, songwriter and rapper AdELA and comedian Quincy Jones.

We invite you to be informed, inspired and a part of the change. Register here and join us on June 23 for Close the Gap 2022!

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