FAQ

The RCIC will work with researchers at all phases of project planning and implementation and can be brought into a study at any point. RCIC staff can provide assistance in generating potential case numbers and can provide boiler-plate documents for grant submission. RCIC staff will work closely with investigators to tailor data collection efforts for the specific needs of each study. Once a study is funded and operational, RCIC staff will regularly attend study team meetings to promote ongoing communication.

It is best to contact us at the earliest possible phase of planning for your study. Our past experience, however, has shown that using the RCIC can also be very helpful to studies and clinical trials experiencing low accrual.

On average, patients are identified four weeks post diagnosis. Some studies require a tighter time frame and others allow for a greater period of time between diagnosis and identification. The RCIC will make every attempt to meet the time requirements of each individual study.

The RCIC utilizes a team of highly trained certified tumor registrars (CTR’s) to provide patient identification and medical record review which allows these activities to begin immediately following IRB approval, eliminating the need for you to hire and train additional staff for these tasks. In addition we have established relationships with many hospitals and IRB’s throughout Eastern Massachusetts which allows for ready access to study information and pathology material following IRB approval. In general, using the RCIC will reduce your overall costs, accelerate the initiation of patient accrual and free your research staff to focus on other aspects of your study.

The RCIC is a fee for service core, and pricing depends on the complexity of the project. Contacting us early in the planning process will allow us to work together to satisfy your needs within the constraints of the overall study budget. We will provide a budget in Excel format as well as a Word document detailing the budget justification which can be used in your grant proposal.

The RCIC has worked with many of the IRB’s in Eastern Massachusetts and will assist you in obtaining IRB approval at each facility. Once IRB approval has been obtained we will begin to identify patients via the cancer registries and pathology departments with which we have established relationships.

Contact Carol Lowenstein using the contact information below. If you have a study in progress, the RCIC will need to be added to your study staff through OPHS. We can work with your clinical research staff to assist in this process.

• 
• 
  • Biostatistics
  • Cancer Pharmacology
  • Cancer Proteomics
  • Cell Manipulation
  • Community Practice
  • Cytogenetics (Pathology)
  • DNA Resource
  • Health Communication
  • High-Throughput Polymorphism Detection
  • Monoclonal Antibody
  • Pathology Specimen Locator (Pathology)
  • Research Pharmacy
  • RNAi
  • Rodent Histopathology (Pathology)
  • Specialized Histopathology Services (Pathology)
  • Tissue Microarray and Imaging (Pathology)
  • Tumor Imaging Metrics
  • Vector
• 
• 
• 
• 
•