Behind the Scenes — February 2020

From the Telehealth Director

Dear Friend of the UNC Cancer Network,

First and foremost, I am very proud to introduce our completed 2020 Professional Oncology Lecture Schedule. This includes twenty-four lectures representing both our Research to Practice (R2P) and Patient Center Care (PCC) series. Please see/print the finalized schedule at: www.unccn.org/proschedule.

In addition to a great deal of the planning and scheduling, Jon has done some excellent design work, which is reflected on this eye-pleasing document. I happen to think it would look great on an office or break room wall!!! Please help us spread the word, and feel free to add the dates to your calendar.

I am also happy to announce that we have been making some upgrades to our studio. In our upcoming lectures you will notice that we are using new backdrops that we installed this week. Thanks to Mary and Vene for their assistance. We will also be using newly installed lavalier microphones, which should improve the audio quality of our lectures. We hope that these are noticeable upgrades.

As always, we look forward to your questions and comments which can help us improve the quality of what we do. We also encourage you to please keep spreading the word about our FREE continuing education lectures to your friends and colleagues. We will always to strive to reach as many health care providers as possible with quality continuing education lectures on oncology-related subjects, across the state of North Carolina. If you know of someone we should add to our list, or someone who manages a distribution list that would benefit from occasional emails from the UNC Cancer Network, please let us know at unccn@unc.edu.

Stay warm and dry in this February, and be sure to join us for:

• Justin Yopp, PhD – The Role of Patient Support Networks in Cancer Outcomes on February 12 at noon.
• Joshua Zeidner, MD – Leukemia 2020 on February 26 at noon.

All the best,
Tim

A Closer Look at “HealthScore,”
a Comprehensive Health Coaching Program

by Carly Baily, MA

Carly Bailey is the Program Director of Physical Activity and Integrative Oncology with the Comprehensive Cancer Support Program; she is a certified exercise physiologist and is pursuing further certification as an integrative health coach. Carly is the program coordinator for HealthScore and has been managing exercise oncology and physical activity interventions for 8 years. In her free time, she is either running for fun or chasing her two kids.

Dr. Bill Wood, a hematologist-oncologist and bone marrow transplant physician at UNC, together with his multidisciplinary team, is building a novel, comprehensive health coaching program called “HealthScore” for cancer patients and survivors. After a successful pilot with 18 bone marrow transplant recipients, Dr. Wood is expanding HealthScore to support the needs of patients with other cancer diagnoses outside of bone marrow transplant. With the support of the Comprehensive Cancer Support Program, HealthScore will be the primary health coaching program offered to cancer patients and survivors at UNC. HealthScore aims to improve physical function, self-efficacy, and access to resources for those affected by cancer through continuous, home-based, individualized health coaching that includes comprehensive physical, psychological, nutritional, social, and other whole-person supportive care.

Program participants are paired with a trained health coach who remotely support participants for 6 months with weekly 1:1 goal setting, physical activity monitoring, symptom tracking, and resource support. Research coordinator Bri Castrogivanni is a certified exercise physiologist and is pursuing further certification as an integrative health coach. With the help of students from the UNC School of Nursing and the UNC Department of Exercise and Sport Science, the program plans to significantly increase its capacity for coaching, delivering the best possible experiences for participants while serving as a unique clinical educational experience for students.

Participants use a wearable fitness tracker during their participation, which tracks physical activity and exercise intensity. Health coaches use tracker data to set weekly goals and monitor physical performance throughout the course of the intervention. Additionally, participants complete weekly surveys that assess physical and psychological symptoms, and monthly surveys that address other domains such as psychological and emotional wellbeing, nutrition, social strain, financial toxicity, and medication adherence. HealthScore works collaboratively with busy oncology clinics to provide patient-reported data in order to alert teams of physical, emotional, or supportive care issues that may need to be addressed in a “just in time” manner. We know that there is a lot of heterogeneity between clinical teams focused on different types of cancers, so we are developing customized integrations for HealthScore within each cancer-based workflow and clinic structure.

In the HealthScore program, a coaching framework is implemented as an alternative, virtual approach to provide supportive services outside of primary oncology visits. In the long run, we hope that HealthScore will improve the patient experience and reduce emergency room visits and unplanned hospitalizations through preserving physical function, managing symptoms, addressing unmet needs, and fostering self-efficacy. The HealthScore team is working closely with UNC-CHAI Core to develop a program-specific website in order to streamline communication between the program and care teams. The website will serve as a centralized hub for all program activities. For the participant, the website will track physical function, exercise prescription, and changes in symptoms; facilitate communication with coaches; guide progressive strength exercises through instructional videos; and provide web-based resources for symptom and supportive care needs. For providers, the website will centralize symptom and supportive care alerts, provide weekly, monthly and performance summaries, and allow for communication with health coaches.

In addition to UNC CHAI-Core, HealthScore has been working collaboratively with other UNC teams for digital, marketing, and web-based support. We used UNC Cancer Network’s campus studio to record and edit instructional videos and patient testimonials for our website. The instructional videos will provide step by step video instructions paired with a visual summary and audio overlay for each exercise. We have recorded 4 patient testimonials, which will be used on our study website to serve as source of encouragement for current participants. We have been working closely with Research For Me to streamline our recruitment materials and ensure that patients will have access to information about our study through their UNC MyChart. We have engaged UNC’s PRO-Core to develop a web-based interface for weekly and monthly patient surveys.

Ultimately, we hope that HealthScore will be adopted by all oncology clinics throughout the NCCH. We hope that HealthScore will improve the patient experience and create lasting, positive health behaviors in patients and survivors. As we prepare to re-launch HealthScore, we anticipate re-engaging the bone marrow transplant and cellular therapy program and will work closely with the Adolescent and Young Adult program, the Breast Cancer Survivorship program, and the Multiple Myeloma program to embed HealthScore in each of these respective workflows. If you are interested in learning more about HealthScore or having our team work with your clinic, please contact Carly Bailey at 919-445-4255 or carly_bailey@med.unc.edu.

Wendell G. Yarbrough, MD, MMHC, FACS
Appointed to AACR Tobacco Products and Cancer Subcommittee

by Heather M. Sinisgalli

Dr. Wendell Yarbrough, Thomas J. Dark Distinguished Professor and Chair of Otolaryngology/Head and Neck Surgery, was appointed to the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Tobacco Products and Cancer Subcommittee. The subcommittee encourages scientific and policy initiatives to reduce tobacco related diseases and cancers. The subcommittee is comprised of doctors across the United States with expertise in smoking cessation, nicotine addiction as well as lung cancer. The committee works closely with the AACR Science Policy and Government Affairs Committee.

Upcoming Live Events

February 12, 2020 | 12:00–1:00 pm

Justin Yopp, PhD

The Role of Patient Support Networks in Cancer Outcomes
unccn.org/02122020

Dr. Justin Yopp will discuss the role of social support in cancer care delivery and cancer outcomes. As part of this presentation, Dr. Yopp will also discuss considerations related to caregivers and to patients who do not have immediate caregiver support.

February 26, 2029 | 12:00–1:00 pm

Joshua Zeidner, MD

Management of Acute Myeloid Leukemia in 2020: A Paradigm Shift for Older Adults?
unccn.org/02262020

UNC Lineberger’s Leukemia Program offers both diagnostic and therapeutic services by incorporating specialists who have developed expertise from multiple disciplines in the care of blood and marrow cancers. These specialists work as a single patient care team who firmly believe that research will improve care of leukemia patients.

Our lecture calendar can be found at unccn.org/events

The Patient Education Corner

Expert information for the patients you care for in language that everyone can understand
by Jennifer Potter, MPH, CHES

Understanding Ovarian Cancer
Victoria Bae-Jump, MD, PhD

In this talk you will learn about ovarian cancer, a cancer that can occur in women. Learn who is most at risk for developing ovarian cancer, if it can be found early, and how it is treated.

Our next Cancer Conversations webinar is on 2/28/2020 at 12:00 noon. Viewers can register by clicking here.

Recent Additions to the Learning Portal

Ellen Ruebush, LCSW, LCAS, NCTTP

Colleen Meyer, MSW, LCSW

Tobacco Use Treatment in Cancer Care
https://learn.unccn.org/courses/tobacco-use-treatment-in-cancer-care-spoc/

Patients who stop using tobacco have improved cancer treatment outcomes and decreased treatment-related side effects, making tobacco use treatment an essential component of cancer care. This lecture will present evidence-based treatment for tobacco use, including guidelines for brief intervention and for prescribing tobacco cessation medications.

More Patient Centered Care Self-Paced Online Courses can be found at learn.unccn.org/cne

Bhisham Chera, MD

Clinical Trial Update in Head and Neck Cancer
https://learn.unccn.org/courses/clinical-trial-update-in-hpv-associated-oropharynx-cancer-spoc/

The Head and Neck Oncology program is actively pursuing a number of clinical trials at UNC. Dr. Bhisham S. Chera will provide an update on some of these trials.

More Research to Practice Self-Paced Online Courses can be found at learn.unccn.org/cne