National Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection Program 30th Anniversary Awardee Highlight: Washington The Breast, Cervical, and Colon Health Program at the Washington State Department of Health reflects on the successes and challenges of cancer screening in the community. Audio Descriptive Text • Tumwater. Breast, Cervical, and Colon Health Program. Washington State Department of Health. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. View of a building. • Andrea, a client, speaking outside of her home and walking with her dog. • Kelly Shaw, MPH, Program Manager, 1991 to 1999 and 2020 to current, Washington. • Andrea in her kitchen, preparing coffee, and going to her dining room. • Pama Joyner, Former BCCHP Program Director, 1999 to 2007 Department of Health. • Andrea working outside. • Andrea speaking. • Kelly Shaw speaking. • Kelly Shaw walking to Dawn Lauser's office to hand results. • Views of PeaceHealth and Kearney Breast Center. • Kelly Shaw speaking. • Pama Joyner with colleagues. • Dawn Lauser, Case Manager, BCCHP PeaceHealth Southwest Washington Medical Center, speaking and answering a call. • Kelly Shaw walking with a client. • Andrea speaking. • Andrea working outside. • Dawn Lauser speaking. • Kelly Shaw speaking. • Andrea looking outside and speaking. • Kelly Shaw looking at her laptop. • Kelly Shaw speaking. • Andrea smiling. • Kelly Shaw speaking. • Special thanks: Pama Joyner (WA DOH), Kelly Shaw (WA DOH), Denise Miller (WA DOH), Kathleen Piper (PHSW), Dawn Lauser (PHSW), and Andrea (client). Thank you to the BCCHP team at DOH (Gwen, Michelle, Zoey and Juno), The Prime Contractor teams at Peace Health Southwest Medical Center, Confluence Health, Citrine Health, Spokane Regional Health District, Yakima Health District, Public Health Seattle and King County, and the hundreds of subcontracted providers and partners that help implement BCCHP. This video was produced and shot in accordance with CDC guidelines for the prevention of COVID-19 that were available at the time. The “Enhancing Cancer Program Grantee Capacity through Peer-to-Peer Learning” project is supported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) as part of a financial assistance award totaling $850,000 with 100 percent funded by CDC/HHS. The contents are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement, by CDC/HHS, or the U.S. Government. Script [Andrea] My name's Andrea Evan Delaplain, and I live in Winlock, Washington. It's a small, tight knit community. [Kelly Shaw] It's very difficult to recruit providers to rural communities or small communities. You know, you look at the underserved populations that we work with, and they are so focused on trying to feed their children, trying to get to work. All of the other priorities that they have in their lives, that their own personal health care tends to get pushed aside. [Andrea] We just didn't have the money. My husband lost his job. So we were basically living on unemployment, but we couldn't even make our mortgage payments. [Pama Joyner] People are scared when they have limited resources, and they're maybe facing a really horrendous health issue. But because of the lack of resources, don't take action. [Andrea] I think I was more worried about how am I going to pay for this than having the breast cancer. [Kelly Shaw] The immediate thought is, now what? [Pama Joyner] We've got people out in the community who are there to assist and help them on that journey in a way that makes them feel supported and safe. [Kelly Shaw] We worked through a series of regional partners to implement our program here in Washington. Each of those partners have patient navigators on staff, that then work to identify what barriers a woman is facing and then provide services to help the woman overcome those barriers. [Dawn Lauser] I'm generally the second call that they get after hearing the news that they have cancer. And so I was there to help put her mind at ease and let her know that she was still going to be able to get treatment for her breast cancer. [Kelly Shaw] We're not just screening women and then saying, oh, you have cancer, now figure it out for yourself. [Andrea] Dawn walked me through the process, and she just really kind of gave me a lot of emotional support and assuring me that, you know, I wouldn't have to worry about the financial part of this. [Dawn Lauser] If I can take that fear, help to take that fear away because of our program, it means the world to people. [Kelly Shaw] We're providing essential services, essential lifesaving services to a population that might otherwise not get them. [Andrea] The mammogram, because it was caught early, gave me a fighting chance to beat this. [Kelly Shaw] In this program, we have diagnosed close to 3,000 cancers. We've performed close to 300,000 mammograms. It feels good to really be able to impact the lives of others and know that with an early diagnosis, these cancers are very, very treatable, and it doesn't have to be a death sentence.