Empowering Community Cancer Care: Promoting Education

In this episode of OncChats: Empowering Community Cancer Care, Amanda M. Woodworth, MD, of Keck Medicine of USC at Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital, and Anirudh Rai, MD, of Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital, discusses her outreach efforts in the Santa Clarita community, including partnering with organizations like the American Cancer Society, hosting educational panels for women, and providing continuing medical education for local physicians to ensure comprehensive cancer care and awareness.

Rai: Overall, I would say we do a lot in a primary care setting, but can you tell us more, Dr Woodworth, about ways you would reach out to the community and impart knowledge to them?

Woodworth: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you, Dr Rai. We do a lot of partnering with community organizations—especially our local branch of the American Cancer Society, really getting out there to do talks with them and support the community in any way we can. I personally have started something in the community called “Girl Talk,” which I call a social educational experience for the women of Santa Clarita Valley, where we bring in a panel of experts and just spend an hour and a half answering the women of the community’s questions about that topic at hand. Obviously, breast cancer is a favorite [topic] of mine. We’ll bring in medical oncology, radiation oncology, surgery, plastic surgery, and radiology, to talk about all aspects of diagnosing and treating breast cancer.

Then, we also offer really neat CMEs for community physicians, which I think is critical. If you’re going to treat cancer in the community, then just make sure that all of your community physicians are up to speed on what you have to offer. I’m currently planning our next CME event, which is going to be happening in just over a month, and we’re going to be talking about integrating genetics into the community. I tend to be a little bit of a nerd when it comes to genetics. I think that this is essential, to be able to educate the community, the patients, and their providers, to make sure everybody is on the same page.