Pilot study of a novel population of head and neck cancer patients in the CRN

Head and neck cancers are challenging to study because of their relatively low incidence. A large, novel population of patients with head and neck cancers that has not been previously studied and distinct from the referral populations has been identified. The National Cancer Institute-funded Health Maintenance Organization Cancer Research Network is a consortium of 15 nonprofit research centers based in large, vertically integrated health care delivery organizations across the United States. They represent a geographically, racially, and socioeconomically diverse population. These community-based organizations provide care to approximately 10 million individuals and 57,692 patients with head and neck cancer. This pilot study and preliminary analysis seeks to demonstrate the potential this network holds as a resource for clinical cancer research and to identify it as a unique resource that allows for more detailed queries than are currently available to researchers.