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Prevention is Missing Its Moment: Community Colleges as Essential Infrastructure for Life-Course Cancer Prevention
Brad Love1,2, Margaret Raber3
1School of Advertising and Public Relations, University of Texas, Austin, TX, USA. lovebrad@utexas.edu.
Cancer prevention efforts overlook early adulthood, a critical life stage. Prioritizing community colleges can address modifiable cancer risks in underserved populations.
Area of Science:
- Public Health
- Epidemiology
- Prevention Science
Background:
- Nearly half of cancer diagnoses stem from modifiable risk factors.
- Early adulthood is a key life-course window for cancer prevention, yet it is under-resourced.
- Community colleges serve millions of diverse students, many with clustered cancer risk behaviors.
Purpose of the Study:
- To argue for prioritizing community colleges as essential settings for life-course cancer prevention.
- To highlight the missed opportunity in neglecting community colleges for early adult intervention.
- To demonstrate how community colleges can support multi-component, theory-driven cancer prevention.
Main Methods:
- Integration of epidemiologic, developmental, and prevention science evidence.
- Analysis of cancer risk behaviors and health inequities concentrated in community college populations.
- Illustration using implementation experience from a community-embedded program at Lee College.
Main Results:
- Early adulthood is a malleable period for shaping cancer risk trajectories.
- Community colleges concentrate modifiable cancer risks and health inequities at scale.
- Place-based prevention strategies are feasible in under-resourced institutional settings.
Conclusions:
- Community colleges are vital, yet underutilized, infrastructure for cancer prevention.
- Failure to invest in community colleges for cancer prevention is a prioritization issue.
- Treating community colleges as essential prevention infrastructure is crucial for addressing early-adult risk.
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