LITTLE ROCK — The American Cancer Society in Central Arkansas is seeking participants for a cancer study it plans to launch in August.
The organization needs about 1,000 volunteers between the ages of 30 and 65 who have had no previous cancer diagnosis, according to a website for the study, called Cancer Prevention Study-3.
Participants will go to one of several central Arkansas sites, where researchers will draw a small amount of blood, measure their waists and administer a survey.
They will also agree to answer follow-up surveys that may be mailed to them years in the future, said Treg Long, state health systems director for the American Cancer Society.
“It’s one of those things where we don’t know what we don’t know,” Long said, noting that researchers may add questions in the future to track environmental and behavioral factors in participants.
Three similar studies administered around the country have helped establish links between smoking and lung cancer, and aspirin use and lowered colon cancer risks.
“People say, ‘I’m doing this to help my children and my grandchildren,’” Long said.
Participants in Cancer Prevention Study-3 may be asked about factors such as their diet and drinking habits, he said.
The American Cancer Society in Central Arkansas worked in Fort Smith to launch another study site last week. It plans to start other Arkansas study locations in 2013.
As of Friday, about 300 participants had signed up for the initial part of the central Arkansas study, which will take place Aug. 8-11, Long said.
Volunteers can sign up at www.cps3centralarkansas.org, selecting a date and an enrollment site in Little Rock, North Little Rock, Bryant or Maumelle.
In total, the American Cancer Society hopes to enroll 300,000 participants from various backgrounds in Cancer Prevention Study-3, drawing from sites around the country, according to its website.
That would make it the organization’s largest nationwide study.
The organization first started such large-scale, long-term studies in the 1950s, when it recruited 122,000 men to test the effects of tobacco use on death rates.
Populations from subsequent cancer studies are aging, creating the need for a new sample of volunteers, the website said.
“This isn’t something you just fill out and walk away,” Long said.
“It gives people a way to help out the public.”
Arkansas, Pages 13 on 07/22/2012