Our primary goal is to improve the health, wellness and quality of life for Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) cancer survivors, ages 15-39. While the rate for cancer survival for most patients in the United States has continued to improve over the past several decades, there has been little recent progress in improving the survival rate for AYAs. As a group, AYA survivors have greater risks for additional cancers and they may suffer effects later in life from their cancer treatments such as fertility and heart problems.

There is frequently a gap in care for AYA cancer survivors as they move from cancer treatment to follow-up care. It is estimated that fewer than 30% of survivors 20 years fro...

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Our primary goal is to improve the health, wellness and quality of life for Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) cancer survivors, ages 15-39. While the rate for cancer survival for most patients in the United States has continued to improve over the past several decades, there has been little recent progress in improving the survival rate for AYAs. As a group, AYA survivors have greater risks for additional cancers and they may suffer effects later in life from their cancer treatments such as fertility and heart problems.

There is frequently a gap in care for AYA cancer survivors as they move from cancer treatment to follow-up care. It is estimated that fewer than 30% of survivors 20 years from diagnosis return for follow-up care and many do not receive follow up care. Many AYA cancer survivors do not have clear directions on what they need to do to reduce risk of second cancers or what an appropriate schedule is for screening. Few AYA survivors have written survivorship plans to guide them. While community and family practice physicians are expected to provide care for AYA cancer survivors, there is a lack of professional continuing education and training.

Our project, called ACCESS-AYA (After Cancer Care Ends, Survivorship Starts for Adolescents and Young Adults) intends to: 1) Develop and deliver professional education to Central Texas medical professionals including family and internal medicine doctors, nurses and nurse practitioners, social workers and physical therapists; 2)Engage with AYA survivors and their families to help them use resources to develop survivorship plans and to learn more about ways to reduce risk and improve their health and well being; and 3) Create networks, information and communication systems to improve access to survivorship services and resources.

We plan to provide our educational programs for healthcare providers, AYA survivors and their families in easy to access internet–based programs that will be available at all times. We will make the programs interesting and interactive and will bring in experts in cancer and survivorship for both the medical and survivor programs. Since a significant number (31%) of the AYA survivors in Central Texas are Latino/Hispanics, ACCESS-AYA will provide educational materials and special radio programs in both English and Spanish. Our print and educational materials for AYA survivors will also be available in English and Spanish and will provide much of the information in the web-based programs because we understand that not everyone has easy access to the Internet.

By creating new networks of doctors, survivors and educational sources, and making it easier for survivors to and their doctors to use survivorship plans, ACCESS-AYA can serve as a model for other survivorship programs and create tools and systems that can be used across Texas to improve the quality of life and well-being of survivors.

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