Lessons learned. What these seven studies teach us

Seven evaluation studies of American Cancer Society programs offer findings useful for improving the programs studied and have larger implications for public health initiatives that rely on volunteers, the training of trainers, professional referral agents, and outreach through faith organizations or other indigenous community groups. Studies documented the following, for example: higher levels of productivity among volunteers who are cancer survivors, have health-related backgrounds, have college degrees, or both; the value of using existing organizations to recruit volunteers; the need for improved selection methods to reduce attrition in programs using "train the trainer" models; and the outreach potential of faith organizations as nodes in social networks within communities. The studies demonstrate to all voluntary health organizations the importance of assembling an accurate database to describe their activities and to enable them to answer important management questions. Lessons from these studies also can contribute to the development of better methods for the study of public health programs and for the incorporation of evaluation into the process of continuous program improvement within voluntary health organizations.