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BackgroundCancer is the greatest disease burden in Korea. Cancer screening can reduce the burden of cancer but cancer screening rates among Koreans remain low. The purposes of this study were to a) understand Koreans' beliefs and knowledge about cancer screening, and b) explore preferred strategies for increasing cancer screening utilization.MethodsWe conducted a descriptive, qualitative study using eight face-to-face focus groups with a total of 64 Koreans aged 40 and over. Participants answered semi-structured, open-ended questions assessing their experiences with, and beliefs, knowledge, and opinions about, cancer screening. All interview data were recorded and analyzed in the context of the health belief model (HBM).ResultsThe most important themes that emerged from the focus group data were (a) perceived susceptibility (most of the participants believed they were not susceptible to cancer; those who perceived themselves susceptible to cancer were reluctant to express it); (b) perceived benefits (early detection and feelings of relief after cancer screening were benefits; participants had screening because they wanted to take advantage of the Korean government's Medical Payment Support program for cancer patients who have participated in the National Cancer Screening program); (c) perceived barriers (no symptoms; self-care when having symptoms; widespread distrust of tests, doctors, and hospitals; unkind health care providers; the financial burdens of advanced cancer screening tests; and the discomfort during cancer screening); and (d) knowledge of the causes of cancer (incorrect knowledge including beliefs that stress, personality, and body overuse cause cancer). Almost all of the participants were very knowledgeable about the seriousness of cancer and were confident that they were able to have cancer screening. Participants preferred strategies of cancer screening using group interventions with family or friends; various information delivery methods; information emphasizing the importance of cancer ...

BackgroundCancer is the greatest disease burden in Korea. Cancer screening can reduce the burden of cancer but cancer screening rates among Koreans remain low. The purposes of this study were to a) understand Koreans' beliefs and knowledge about cancer screening, and b) explore preferred strategies for increasing cancer screening utilization.MethodsWe conducted a descriptive, qualitative study using eight face-to-face focus groups with a total of 64 Koreans aged 40 and over. Participants answered semi-structured, open-ended questions assessing their experiences with, and beliefs, knowledge, and opinions about, cancer screening. All interview data were recorded and analyzed in the context of the health belief model (HBM).ResultsThe most important themes that emerged from the focus group data were (a) perceived susceptibility (most of the participants believed they were not susceptible to cancer; those who perceived themselves susceptible to cancer were reluctant to express it); (b) perceived benefits (early detection and feelings of relief after cancer screening were benefits; participants had screening because they wanted to take advantage of the Korean government's Medical Payment Support program for cancer patients who have participated in the National Cancer Screening program); (c) perceived barriers (no symptoms; self-care when having symptoms; widespread distrust of tests, doctors, and hospitals; unkind health care providers; the financial burdens of advanced cancer screening tests; and the discomfort during cancer screening); and (d) knowledge of the causes of cancer (incorrect knowledge including beliefs that stress, personality, and body overuse cause cancer). Almost all of the participants were very knowledgeable about the seriousness of cancer and were confident that they were able to have cancer screening. Participants preferred strategies of cancer screening using group interventions with family or friends; various information delivery methods; information emphasizing the importance of cancer prevention; convenient, free, or inexpensive services; and kind health care providers.ConclusionsThis HBM-based research suggests that beliefs in low susceptibility to cancer, many barriers to cancer screening, and incorrect knowledge should be the foci for increasing cancer screening rates in Koreans. Interventions could change individual cultural beliefs and increase knowledge as well as the quality of health care for Koreans.

PURPOSE: Next-generation sequencing (NGS) oncology panels are becoming integral in hospital and academic settings to guide patient treatment and enrollment in clinical trials. Although NGS technologies have revolutionized decision-making for cancer therapeutics, physicians may face many challenges in parsing and prioritizing NGS-based test results to determine the best course of treatment for individual patients. On January 29, 2018, the US Food and Drug Administration held a public workshop entitled, "Weighing the Evidence: Variant Classification and Interpretation in Precision Oncology." Here, we discuss the presentations and discussion highlights across the four sessions of the workshop. METHODS: The goal of the public workshop was to engage stakeholders and solicit input from experts in precision oncology to discuss the integration of complex NGS data into patient management and regulatory innovation within the precision oncology community. The US Food and Drug Administration gathered representatives from academia, industry, patient advocacy, government, and professional organizations for a series of presentations followed by panel discussions. After the workshop, the transcript and speaker presentation slides were reviewed and summarized for manuscript preparation. RESULTS: Speakers and panelists provided diverse perspectives on the integration of NGS technology into patient care for oncology and on the complexities that surround data interpretation and sharing. Discussions highlighted the challenges with standardization for variant classification while expressing the utility of consensus recommendations among stakeholders in oncology for driving innovation in the era of precision medicine. CONCLUSION: As precision medicine advances, clear communication within the field of precision oncology will be key to creating an environment that facilitates the generation and sharing of data that have value to patients. CONTEXT: Key Objective. To provide an overview of a public workshop hosted by the US Food and Drug ...

Objective: Asthma is the most common chronic disease in children. Short-acting bronchodilator medications are the most commonly prescribed asthma treatment worldwide, regardless of disease severity. Puerto Rican children display the high­est asthma morbidity and mortality of any US population. Alarmingly, Puerto Rican children with asthma display poor broncho­dilator drug response (BDR). Reduced BDR may explain, in part, the increased asthma morbidity and mortality observed in Puerto Rican children with asthma. Gene-environ­ment interactions may explain a portion of the heritability of BDR. We aimed to identify gene-environment interactions as­sociated with BDR in Puerto Rican children with asthma.Setting: Genetic, environmental, and psycho-social data from the Genes-environ­ments and Admixture in Latino Americans (GALA II) case-control study.Participants: Our discovery dataset con­sisted of 658 Puerto Rican children with asthma; our replication dataset consisted of 514 Mexican American children with asthma.Main Outcomes Measures: We assessed the association of pairwise interaction mod­els with BDR using ViSEN (Visualization of Statistical Epistasis Networks).Results: We identified a non-linear interac­tion between Native American genetic ancestry and air pollution significantly as­sociated with BDR in Puerto Rican children with asthma. This interaction was robust to adjustment for age and sex but was not significantly associated with BDR in our replication population.Conclusions: Decreased Native American ancestry coupled with increased air pollu­tion exposure was associated with increased BDR in Puerto Rican children with asthma. Our study acknowledges BDR's phenotypic complexity, and emphasizes the importance of integrating social, environmental, and bi­ological data to further our understanding of complex disease.Ethn Dis. 2021;31(1):77- 88; doi:10.18865/ed.31.1.77