Cancer Clinical Trials
Purpose of this site
Welcome to the North Coast Area Health Service Cancer Clinical Trials Website!
This site is intended for the use by cancer clinical trial sponsors to obtain the information required for feasibility questionnaires and the correct nomenclature needed for legal paperwork. Obviously, there will still be some information required by the Investigators and Research Staff, however it is hoped that this website will answer may of the questions you may have.
About the NCAHS
Geography
North Coast Area Health Service (NCAHS) covers an area of 25,570 square kilometres extending from Port Macquarie in the south, Queensland in the north and westward to the Great Dividing Range.
NCAHS shares a state border with Queensland. Residents of the southern Gold Coast and Tweed Valley share primary, secondary and tertiary health services provided by both Queensland and NSW Health Services.
The western and southern borders of NCAHS join the Hunter/New England Area Health Service, where there are some natural flows across these borders.
Settlement patterns of residents in the NCAHS show higher concentrations on the coastal strip, with large coastal settlements at Port Macquarie, Coffs Harbour, Ballina and Tweed Heads. Inland there is a high concentration of people in the city of Lismore. The remaining population is scattered over larger areas, making delivery of health services to isolated areas more difficult.
Population
NCAHS includes 12 Local Government Areas (LGAs), with an estimated population in 2006 of 480,675 (Source: Transport and Population Data Centre, Department of Planning v0.1, 2005 release).
Several southern Gold Coast Statistical Local Areas (SLAs) access services in the Tweed Valley thus increasing the catchments’ population by 52,728. Therefore, the estimated population accessing public services of the NCAHS can be as large as 533,403.
Growth
NCAHS has the fastest growing population of any Area Health Service in NSW. The population of the NCAHS is projected to increase to 509,573 by 2011. This projected annualised growth rate of 1.2% is higher than the State-wide projection of 0.9%. The LGAs with the highest projected annualised growth are Tweed (1.8%), Hastings (1.7%) Coffs Harbour (1.7%) Byron (1.4%) and Ballina (1.4%) (Source: Transport and Population Data Centre, Department of Planning v0.1, 2005 release).
High growth is also expected in the southern Gold Coast region thus increasing the catchments’ population for the Tweed Valley even further.
Age of the population
The proportion of the population aged 0 to 14 years in NCAHS is 19%, the same as the NSW average. NCAHS has a slightly lower proportion of people aged 15-24 years (12%) compared to NSW (14%) and aged 25-64 years (51% in NCAHS compares to 54% in NSW). NCAHS has the highest proportion of people aged 65 years and over at 19% of the population compared to the NSW average of 13%. (Source: Transport and Population Data Centre, Department of Planning v0.1, 2005 release).font>
Growth in aged population
By 2011, it is predicted that the proportion of people in NCAHS aged 65 years and over will have increased from 19% to 21% of the total population. This age group will grow at a higher rate than the State-wide aged population, which is expected to grow from 13% to 15% of the total population over the same period.
Cancer Clinical Trials within the North Coast Area Health Service
NCAHS have four very active enthusiastic Cancer Clinical Trial Units:
- Oncology Clinical Trials Office based at The Tweed Hospital
- Cancer Clinical Trials Unit based at Lismore Base Hospital
- Clinical Cancer Research Unit based at North Coast Cancer Institute @ Coffs Harbour
- Clinical Cancer Research Unit based at North Coast Cancer Institute @ Port Macquarie
Under the NSW Cancer Institute’s Clinical Cancer Research Management program, Dr. Stephen Begbie is the Area Director for Clinical Cancer Research. Under the same program there is also the Cancer Trials Network Manager who liaises with all sites as a resource/problem-solving person by monthly teleconference, newsletter and bi-monthly videoconference which is also attended by Investigators.