The Northeast Colorado Health Department was funded to work with the Alliance for HPV Free Colorado. The Alliance for HPV Free Colorado (Alliance) uses a multidisciplinary, socio-ecological approach to increase HPV vaccine series completion among 11-17 year olds in a 15 county region. During a previous grant, the Alliance tested campaign creative and messaging with mothers of 11-17 year olds in the Denver metro region; however these were not tested in rural/frontier and Spanish-speaking audiences. Through this proposal, the Alliance will work to increase reach of campaign materials to parents of 11-17 year olds in Spanish-speaking and rural/frontier communities and test the effectiveness of our webpage in meeting the information needs of parents in our regions. In order to best serve our communities, we need to understand the most effective strategies for messaging and messaging channels for the diverse communities the Alliance covers. Rural/frontier communities have comparatively low HPV vaccination rates that in time will lead to disparate cancer rates and Latinas are at greater risk for being diagnosed with cervical cancer. With this project, the Alliance aims to address these health inequities in the region.

 

Join the HPV Free COmmunity Advocate Group!

 

The Alliance for HPV Free Colorado is looking for parents of children and adolescents, in addition to community members who have experience with HPV-related cancer, to join a newly-launched community advocacy group—The HPV Free COmmunity—and speak up for the cancer-preventing power of the HPV vaccine! This group is part of efforts by the Alliance for HPV Free Colorado, a 15-county collaborative between local public health partners, to improve HPV vaccination rates in our state and protect communities from HPV-associated cancer. Depending upon each individual advocate’s preferences, advocacy opportunities could include sharing a personal story, writing a blog post, submitting a letter to the editor to a local newspaper, attending a community event, sharing social media messages, or simply talking to friends and neighbors in your local community. If you are interested in joining this important group, please fill out the Involvement Form.

 

HPV Free COmmunity Flyer

The Colorado Cancer Coalition Steering Committee has prioritized 3 new work groups and 1 revitalized Task Force.

The intention for the groups is that they will form and dissolve as needed and will align with broader efforts across the Coalition and task forces vs. working on one specific cancer type. While there will certainly still be some work done on specific cancer types, we want to use these work groups as a place to create a stronger, united voice with consistent messaging, strong calls to action and less duplication of effort.

Provider Education Work Group (screening & prevention focused)
First priority: Define audience(s) – Primary care, specialty care, others, etc
Potential Strategies: COPIC collaboration, lunch and learns, webinar series, continuing education credit opportunities/partnerships, etc
Policy Work Group
First priority: Convene all Task Force leads to discuss current policy agenda; Determine policy needs of Task Forces
Potential Strategies: Comprehensive Cancer Day at the Capital (during legislative session and/or collaborate with ACS CAN Day at the Capitol), various policy initiatives
General Public Awareness and Education Work Group
First priority: Define overall goal(s)
Second priority: Define target events and target audiences
Potential Strategies: Includes health fairs, Sun Bus collaboration, media relations and general population awareness efforts (awareness months, etc), employer policy education?

If you’d like to join a work group, please contact us with the group(s) you would like to join.

P.S. In 2016 we briefly had a Financial Barriers Task Force. Financial toxicity is a buzz word right now and will continue to be for those affected by cancer. There has been some interest in re-starting this group. If you would be interested in participating in the Financial Barriers Task Force, please let us know. If there are enough people interested, we will bring this Task Force back.

P.P.S. The other Task Forces are still meeting and will continue to do so. If you haven’t joined one yet, you can read all about them here: https://www.coloradocancercoalition.org/task-forces/

Sarah Cannon, a member of the Colorado Cancer Coalition, adds two new doctors to their clinical research team.

Shiraj Sen, MD, PhD, and Manojkumar Bupathi, MD, MS,
Join Sarah Cannon Research Institute at HealthONE

Full article