Background

The high rates of cancer among American Indians and Alaska Natives are of growing concern.

Context

In response to high cancer rates, national, state, and tribal organizations have worked to assess knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and screening practices related to cancer in American Indian and Alaska Native communities and to increase awareness and use of cancer screening. The National Comprehensive Cancer Control Program (NCCCP) of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is one such effort. NCCCP's comprehensive cancer control (CCC) planning process provides a new approach to planning and implementing cancer control programs. The CCC process and components for American Indians and Alaska Natives are not yet fully understood because this is a fairly new approach for these communities. Therefore, the purpose of our case study was to describe the CCC process and its outcomes and successes as applied to these communities and to identify key components and lessons learned from the South Puget Intertribal Planning Agency's (SPIPA's) CCC planning and community mobilization process.

Methods

We used interviews, document reviews, and observations to collect data on SPIPA's CCC planning and community mobilization process.

Consequences

We identified the key components of SPIPA's CCC as funding and hiring key staff, partnering with outside organizations, developing a project management plan and a core planning team, creating community cancer orientations, conducting community cancer surveys, developing a community advisory committee, ongoing training and engaging of the community advisory committee, and supporting the leadership of the communities involved.

Interpretation

The CCC planning process is a practicable model, even for groups with little experience or few resources. The principles identified in this case study can be applied to the cancer control planning process for other tribes.