Cancer Outreach and Relief Effort

C.O.R.E. stands for Cancer Outreach and Relief Effort which is a community service project sponsored by AMSA. CORE pairs medical students with pediatric oncology patients and their siblings. The program is intended to provide individual emotional support for the patients and their siblings as well as relief for their parents. It allows medical students to gain a better understanding of the issues involved in chronic illness. CORE was founded at Brown University by Carol Karp, and the program has been quite successful there. At the AMSA National Convention in 1989 Patricia Anastasio and Mark Shane became project coordinators and were very enthusiastic about starting a program at their school, the University of South Florida College of Medicine. They decided to document their process, step by step, in order to develop a guide to instruct other students on how to begin similar programs at medical schools all over the country. Because circumstances will differ from school to school, this is only intended to be a guide. Variations can be made to fit the needs of your specific situation. For example, the University of South Florida College of Medicine is closely affiliated with the Children's Cancer Center at the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute. This Center also cares for children with hemophilia and sickle cell anemia. Therefore, the program there includes children with these illnesses as well as patients with all types of cancer.

C.O.R.E. is available as online in PDF format.

In summary, the steps are:

1. Decide who will be involved in the program and what you want to accomplish.
2. You will need at least 3 positions filled: Student Coordinator (to organize the students); Faculty Advisor (to be a liaison and give advise); and a Patient Coordinator (to organize the families).
3. You will need to write Program Principles outlining your policies and procedures. You will need to outline your purpose, scope, responsibility, practice (how the pediatric family is involved, how the medical students are involved). Write guidelines for your medical students. Write guidelines for the parents. Make both sets of guidelines practical and helpful.
4. Recruit participants. Get medical student volunteers. Have parents sign permission slips if your particular situation requires this, e.g. if the patients will be transported in vehicles or taken on outings. Prepare medical student application forms and parent permission slips beforehand.
5. Hold a training session for the students. Make sure all students know your guidelines, and what is reasonable for them to do. Then students can be given an overview of the physical and emotional aspects of the types of illnesses they will be dealing with. Then students and patients are matched, and the students encouraged to begin their interactions with the patients and their families in a comfortable setting, before the students take the patients out on activities.
6. Support Meetings. Every month or so, the medical students should all meet for educational/ support purposes.
7. Closure. At the end of the year, a farewell picnic or good-bye letters will help with closure.
8. Community involvement. Where possible, consider community resources that can be tapped, including publicity from local press. Get as many people involved and excited about your project- it will help with funds, and the future of your program.