President’s Cancer Panel Examining Barriers to Care

BETHESDA, Md—The President’s Cancer Panel is conducting a series of seven regional meetings to explore the question, “Why don’t all Americans get the best available cancer care?” The panel is seeking to identify specific barriers to care and ways to overcome them.

The meetings, designed to gather information from all 50 states, will hear public testimony from people who have encountered barriers to obtaining cancer care and from physicians, nurses, social workers, patient advocates, and health care officials. The first meeting was held in Omaha, Nebraska, in June, and the last meeting will be held in Washington, DC, in May 2001.