LSU Health New Orleans awarded $15 million in federal grants to support cancer education, detection programs

SOURCE: http://www.theadvocate.com/new_orleans/news/business/article_2ad22930-7c6c-11e7-b25a-6b47413bf8ad.html

The LSU Health New Orleans School of Public Health has been awarded a $15 million federal grant to support its cancer education, early detection, comprehensive control and registry programs.

The money, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will pay over five years, will go toward the school’s Louisiana Breast and Cervical Health program, which offers no-cost mammograms and Pap tests to low-income or underinsured women across the state; its Comprehensive Cancer Control Program, which focuses on preventable cancers and tobacco use and obesity as cancer risk-factors; as well as the Louisiana Tumor Registry, a statewide population-based cancer registry.

“More than half of all cancers are preventable or can be detected early and cured,” said Donna Williams, director of Louisiana Cancer Prevention and Control Programs and LSU Health’s associate dean for public health practice and community engagement. “While Louisiana has one of the highest death rates from cancer in the country, the cancer control programs at LSU Health New Orleans School of Public Health are working across the state to help Louisianians prevent cancers.”