Organizations and structures that facilitate community research

The Southwest Oncology Group has become a model for other oncology organizations in the way it facilitates participation of community physicians and their cancer patients in clinical trials. The Southwest Oncology Group accomplishes this through its Community Clinical Oncology Program and Cooperative Group Outreach Program. The Community Clinical Oncology Program brings state-of-the-art cancer treatment, prevention, and control research to the community hospital setting, where most cancer patients receive treatment. The Cooperative Group Outreach Program broadens community participation in clinical trials beyond the extent achievable through Community Clinical Oncology Program. Together, these programs have succeeded in increasing community physician participation in clinical trials and have shown that community physicians are capable of submitting data comparable in quality to those obtained in the academic setting.