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September 2007 Newsletter

Hello Everyone & Welcome to our September 2007 Newsletter

As the anniversary of Susan's life approaches, I’ve taken the time to reflect on all that has happened since her untimely passing. No one could have imagined that her foundation, in less than three years, would have accomplished so much and became a leader, if not the leader, in the battle against Colon Cancer. Due to the tremendous success of our website, we are attracting millions of new people searching for answers and many new subscribers. I’d like to share with you the excitement of our most recent program, which we are confident will be the most effective effort in history to increase the number of
all types of screenings, focusing on the colonoscopy.

Through a joint venture with PriMed, the industry leader in accredited educational programs for Primary Care Physicians, and supported through an Educational Grant from Ethicon Endo-Surgery, the first phase of the Susan Cohan Primary Care Educational Series “The Gold Standards in Prevention and Treatment” has been completed. From our work and research, we realized that the best way to increase screenings and save thousands of lives per year would be to attack the problem at the beginning through work with local doctors.

We believe that doctors lack the time, education, and an economic incentive to discuss colon cancer. The Gold Standards program is divided into three categories to provide Primary Care Physicians, Internists, Family Practitioners, Geriatric Physicians, and Nurse Practitioners an update on:

1.) Screening Methods: This section will include updates on all of the most current screening methods, preparation, shifts in recommended age recommendations for multiple ethnicities, and recognizing signs in patients younger than the recommended screening ages.

2.) Surgical Options: Today’s technology has provided options for the patient facing Colon Cancer surgery. Traditional surgery requires an incision the length of the abdomen, significant scarring, and a long recovery period. Advances in Minimally Invasive Procedures, MIP's, or Laparoscopic Surgery, allows many patients to receive equal or better results with two small incisions and a few days of recovery time. Dr. David Stein, the Foundation's Educational Director and a renowned Laparoscopic Surgeon from Hahneman Hospital and Drexel University, is developing the content for this section.

3.) We hope to provide the Primary Care Physician with a more clearly defined and comfortable role to help guide their patient and their family through the many challenges, both physical and emotional, throughout the patients’ treatment. We will educate the PCP on the most recent treatment methods for the early stages of colon cancer, and equally important, the emotional support role that the PCP can provide.

This program will reach thousands of Primary Care Physicians this year with our goal to reach hundreds of thousands in 2008. We are very excited and truly blessed to take on this challenge. We are working on additional opportunities with more and more companies to lead the way in a partnership with the PCP's in the battle against Colon Cancer. Again, we are confident this program will ultimately save hundreds of thousands of lives.

There is so much more to discuss. We are producing so many events that are reaching millions of people throughout North America. We are so thankful that we are able to provide resources and guidance to the millions of visitors to our site. I'll bring you up to date on all of these next month.

For now, we are once again reminded of Susie's guidance in all that we do and it is no coincidence that we will launch this incredible new program to celebrate her life.

Your generosity will continue to enable our foundation to continue its mission to eradicate Colon Cancer as a life threatening disease. Please visit the donations section of our website and help us to reach our goals. As always, you can reach me at bobby@coloncancerfoundation.org.

Robert Smith
Executive Director