Scottsdale Healthcare steps up cancer services

by Ken Alltucker – Feb. 23, 2012 05:41 PM
The Republic | azcentral.com

Scottsdale Healthcare has bolstered its cancer-care offerings with a new bone-marrow transplant program that will serve patients receiving treatment for aggressive blood cancers.

The new program at the Virginia G. Piper Cancer Center at Scottsdale Shea Medical Center will cater to patients who are battling blood cancers such as myeloma, leukemia and lymphoma.

The program is staffed by two physicians who are bone-marrow transplant specialists and a team of nearly 40 support staff, including nurses, care coordinators, social workers, administrators and others.

Scottsdale Healthcare’s new program largely includes practitioners who previously staffed a bone-marrow transplant program at Banner Good Samaritan Medical Center in Phoenix.

The physicians and some support staff left when Banner Health sought to relocate the program to the new Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center, which opened last fall in Gilbert.

Drs. Jeffrey Schriber and Adrienne Briggs, both bone-marrow transplant specialists, established the Cancer Transplant Institute at Virginia G. Piper Cancer Center because they viewed it as a better fit for their team.

“Much of our team is part of the previous Banner Health team,” Schriber said. “For a variety of reasons, it didn’t end up working there.”

Mayo Clinic operates the other major bone-marrow transplant program in metro Phoenix. Mayo’s program has 10 physicians and treated 200 adults and 21 children last year, more than doubling its transplant cases since 2008, according to figures provided by Mayo Clinic.

Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center also is recruiting physicians and support staff for a bone-marrow transplant program, but the Gilbert cancer center has not established an expected launch date for the program, a spokeswoman said.

Chemotherapy treatment targeting cancerous tumors can damage a person’s bone marrow, resulting in low blood counts and weakened immune systems. The bone marrow can come from donors or from the patient’s own stem cells collected before the patient undergoes chemotherapy. The patient gets the transplants to counteract the side effects from chemotherapy, particularly in blood cancers that require high chemotherapy doses to target aggressive tumors.

The new Scottsdale Healthcare program opened in November. Physicians have seen about 50 patients and recently performed their first transplant at the new program.

The program includes an outpatient center within the Virginia G. Piper Cancer Center at 10460 N. 92nd St. It also has a 13-bed inpatient unit with a specialized air system designed to protect patients when they are vulnerable to infection.

Schriber said the program has been accredited by the Foundation for the Accreditation of Cellular Therapy, a designation that health insurers require before allowing payment.

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/business/articles/2012/02/23/20120223scottsdale-healthcare-steps-up-cancer-services.html

 

Invitation: Stakeholder Input for CDC Proposal for Arizona Cancer Programs

Hello Everyone:

The Arizona Department of Health Services will host an I-link session on Tuesday, February 28, 2012, from 2 – 4 p.m. to provide an overview of the recently released Cancer Prevention and Control Programs Request for Applications (RFA) from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).  This I-link session will also provide an opportunity for input into the ADHS response and proposal. 

This is a five year competitive grant application to the existing cooperative agreement that funds the Arizona Cancer Registry, Arizona Comprehensive Cancer Control and the Well Woman HealthCheck Program.  This grant opportunity has two new components, including a highly competitive innovative demonstration project.  The grant also includes some focus on policy approaches and health systems changes.  The grant is due March 26, 2012. 

Attached you will find a summary of the RFA.  Visit grants.gov to view the full RFA and search for CDC-RFA-DP12-1205. 

To encourage broad-based participation we are offering this I-link session to support participation and discussion.  You may also attend the session person.   The session will be held at:

Arizona Department of Health Services
150 N. 18^th Ave,  Room: 415B
Phoenix, Az  85007

Date:  February 28, 2012

Time:  2:00 pm – 4:00 pm

Call In Number:  1-877-820-7831

Passcode:  514569#

I-link:  https://azdhs.ilinc.com/join/yzcwtsw

If you have any questions, please contact Virginia Warren at 602-542-1222 or by email at Virginia.Warren@azdhs.gov or me at 602-542-1436 or by email at Patricia.Tarango@azdhs.gov.

 Thank you.

Patricia Tarango
Bureau Chief
Health Systems Development

Description_of_CDC_Funding_Opportunity_Summary_Final_2_23_12 (3)

Stakeholder_Input_Webinar_Agenda

 

Smoke-Free AZ Phone Application

The ADHS Smoke-Free Arizona Program is excited to announce that it has launched a phone application that will allow Arizonans to quickly and easily submit complaints when they observe violations of the Smoke-Free Arizona Act.  This free phone App will allow Arizonans to take a picture of the violation and send it, along with GPS coordinates and other descriptive information about the business in violation, to the ADHS Smoke-Free Arizona Program who will file the complaint.  The App can be downloaded on both Androids and iPhones by searching for the keyword “mysmokefreeaz.” Once installed, users can open the App and follow the prompts under the “Report” tab to submit their complaints.  Additional information about the “mysmokefreeaz” App will be posted on the Smoke-Free Arizona website (www.smokefreearizona.org).

Invitation to Arizona Health Services Through the Century

Click Here to View the Invitation

NEWS: Smokefree homes, healthier food through local licensing, and more

WINTER 2012 
How One City Tackled “Teen-Friendly” Cigars

Just south of Los Angeles in the city of Huntington Park, community leaders were growing concerned about a candy-flavored tobacco product that had become popular among young smokers.

Little cigars, sold individually in flavors like grape, cherry, and vanilla for less than $1 apiece, had become the new tobacco product of choice. Selling flavored or individually packaged cigarettes is illegal, but little cigars – which often look like cigarettes and can contain up to four times as much nicotine – aren’t subject to the same federal regulations.

A city planner in Huntington Park contacted us for help. As part of an ad hoc committee of different city agencies working to develop a law regulating local tobacco sellers, she wanted to be sure to include restrictions on these candy-flavored cigars.

We drafted strong model policy language establishing a minimum pack size for the products to make them less accessible to young people. Communities can adopt the policy on its own or as part of a larger tobacco retailer licensing program, as Huntington Park did. See our website for more on limiting “teen-friendly” cigars, including our model policy language.

Want Healthier Restaurants in Town? Here’s a New Approach

Families are eating out more than ever: Americans today spend half – yes, half! – their food budgets on restaurant food. That can translate into a lot of calories from restaurant kitchens.

What can local governments do to motivate these eateries to shape up their menus? Check out our new toolkit, “Putting Health on the Menu,” to find out how to create a program that gives restaurant owners plenty of incentives to upgrade the nutritional quality of their offerings. Then contact us for help adapting our model program to your community’s needs.

Healthy Transportation Planning: Get on Board!  

You already know why public health advocates should get involved in transportation planning: the way our roads and public transit systems are designed has a lot to do with how much exercise we get, our exposure to noise and air pollution, our risk of getting into traffic accidents, and more.

But it’s not always easy to figure out how to get into the game. Download “Getting Involved in Transportation Planning” for a practical how-to guide to navigating the maze of agencies that oversee the process. This guide was produced in partnership with TransForm, a nonprofit working to create walkable communities and world-class public transportation.

 

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