SABOR

Background

Since its launch in 2001, the SABOR study has enrolled more than 3,000 healthy men, including nearly 50 percent from minority groups, a rate much higher than other large national studies of prostate cancer. Now the researchers plan to compare the genetic signatures of men who have had the disease against the signatures of men who have not had it.

“It is especially important for three groups of men to seriously consider participating – men with a family history of prostate cancer, African-American men and Hispanic men,” said Dr. Ian M. Thompson Jr., principal investigator for SABOR and professor and deputy chairman of surgery at the Health Science Center.
“These three groups are seriously affected by the disease and have not been the subject of sufficient research in the past. As it appears that there is a distinctly different set of risk factors for each ethnic group, it is extremely important that this wide range of individuals participate in this study.”

Screenings are held throughout the city at clinics of the University Health System, the South Texas Veterans Health Care System, Wilford Hall Medical Center, Brooke Army Medical Center, the Cancer Therapy and Research Center, the University Physicians Group, the Barrio Comprehensive Family Health Center and the Ella Austin Health Center.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) is funding the study as part of its Early Detection Research Network. Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore is the only other research site for the prostate cancer project. This program will recruit from all ethnic groups with a focus on over-sampling of underserved and minority populations.

“Dr. Thompson is very dedicated to science and the health process,” said visiting scientist Dr. Sudhir Srivastava, chief of the Cancer Biomarkers Research Group in the NCI’s Division of Cancer Prevention. “Ian is one of the very valuable assets to the NCI and the nation, and his team is playing a major role in the early detection network.”

Contact the SABOR office for more information:

Local: 210- 567-0214
Toll-Free: 800-335-4594