Kentucky Lung Cancer Program: Screening, Early Detection, Health Disparities and Biomarker Testing

Participants will learn about lung cancer incidence, prevention, early detection, screening eligibility, and the benefits of screening. The United States Preventative Services Task Force (USPSTF) lung cancer screening guidelines will be introduced.  Physicians and other healthcare professionals will discuss patient support, reducing barriers to screening, and other resources to help with insurance coverage and costs.

Low-dose CT is a powerful tool that leads to increased detection of cancers at an earlier, more treatable stage, making it imperative that lung cancer screening with this imaging technique be provided to African American patients who so greatly need it and benefit from it.

Participants will learn about how physicians utilize biomarker testing to optimize treatment decisions that are improving lung cancer survival through precision medicine. Precision medicine is a model that allows physicians to personalize treatment decisions for each person diagnosed ​with lung cancer. The personalized approach involves your primary care physician, surgeon, and oncologist working together to identify the best treatment that will more effectively target your specific type of lung cancer. Healthcare professionals will discuss how to improve access to biomarker testing and precision ​medicine in communities of color.

Learning Objectives:

To understand the causes of lung cancer.

To recognize the risk factors of lung cancer.

To understand why health disparities exist in lung cancer detection and screening.

To understand why screening is beneficial to detecting lung cancer early.

To understand what the process for screening looks like from the patient’s perspective.

To understand how immunotherapy, targeted therapies, minimally invasive surgery, and are improving lung cancer survival and quality of life