Tiffany Galligan, Lynda Taylor, MSW, Jennifer Fogliani, MA, and Randall Macon. Education, Lance Armstrong Foundation, PO Box 161150, Austin, TX 78716, 512-236-8820 x128, tiffany.galligan@laf.org

The Lance Armstrong Foundation has created an educational program for individuals living with a history of cancer, Live Strong. Live Strong communicates physiological, psychosocial, legal, and practical information to cancer survivors and their caregivers. The program’s editorial team has collaborated with health care professionals, researchers, attorneys, and advocates to develop information that succinctly and accurately answers questions about quality-of-life issues.

Being one of the first resources for quality-of-life information for cancer survivors, our program had to first create awareness among cancer survivors, and then continue to educate as to how this information applies to their personal experiences. Through formal and informal focus groups with a diverse set of cancer survivors, guidance and advice from the CDC and NCI, as well as through the application of educational theories (including Zones of Proximal Development), we were able to understand how information was most widely accepted and understood, and translate these practices into a tangible program.

Our primary goal is to enable cancer survivors to take a more active role in decisions that affect their quality of life. By providing information in a format that resonates easily with our constituents, our program effectively achieves these goals. Live Strong provides accessible health information as well as decision-support tools; all information has been peer reviewed and validated by the health care community. The lessons we have learned about developing health-focused content at a highly-accessible reading level make the Live Strong program (http://www.livestrong.org) a valuable model for delivering public health information on the Internet.

Learning Objectives: