The Strategy and Action Plan
CancerForward provides a virtual portal where survivors can locate other survivors and create communities and support groups among themselves. Those who wish to remain anonymous may. The site offers highly-desirable content focused on first-hand, participant-based experience, current information from trained experts or guides, access to local resources, and aggregation of survivor data, such as polls and statistical surveys.
CancerForward will soon complete construction of a content management site that can be reached through a variety of access points and will include multiple highly integrated social platforms to support the interactive exchange of information. In a unique architectural model, the site has been designed to maximize social media access and the viral mechanism of social networking among user populations to provide quick and broad-based notification to cancer survivors of the existence of the CancerForward website and access to a CancerForward survivor community.
To ensure editorial integrity and relevancy of content, CancerForward relies upon a diverse national advisory board of survivors, leading oncology and psychosocial professionals, theologians and medical health writers. Initially, CancerForward will create content for its website. As its user community grows, site subject matter will become increasingly user-generated. Community participants will be able to join groups, ask questions, and subscribe to blogs. “Community managers” overseen by CancerForward will maintain a clean and organized presentation of the information being exchanged.
As CancerForward matures, it will underwrite grant awards to establish and maintain educational and resource survivorship programs at healthcare institutions and community-based organizations throughout the U.S.