National Cancer Institute
National Cancer Institute U.S. National Institutes of Health www.cancer.gov

CTWG Steering Committee System

The Steering Committees strive to enhance the National Cancer Clinical Trials Enterprise through the implementation of Prioritization/Scientific Quality Initiatives 1, 2, and 3 of the CTWG Report (PDF - 366KB).

Goals of the Committees

Scientific Steering Committees (SSCs) are composed of leading cancer experts and advocates from outside the Institute as well as NCI senior investigators who meet regularly to:

  • increase the transparency and openness of the trial design and prioritization process;
  • enhance patient advocate and community oncologist involvement in clinical trial design and prioritization;
  • convene Clinical Trial Planning Meetings to identify critical questions, unmet needs, and prioritize key strategies.

SSCs may establish one or more Task Forces and/or Working Groups that focus on specific diseases or scientific areas of interest.

Disease-Specific Steering Committees (DSSC):

Brain Malignancies Steering Committee

Breast Cancer Steering Committee

Gastrointestinal Steering Committee

Genitourinary Steering Committee

Gynecologic Steering Committee

Head and Neck Steering Committee

Leukemia Steering Committee

Lymphoma Steering Committee

Myeloma Steering Committee

Pediatric and Adolescent Solid Tumor Steering Committee

Pediatric Leukemia and Lymphoma Steering Committee

Thoracic Malignancy Steering Committee

Roles of the Committees
are to:

Leverage current Intergroup, Cooperative Group, SPORE, and Cancer Center structures by:

  • increasing information exchange at an early stage of trial development;
  • increasing the efficiency of clinical trial collaboration;
  • reducing trial redundancy (phase II and phase III);
  • developing, evaluating, and prioritizing concepts for phase III and large phase II clinical trials.

Investigational Drug Steering Committee (IDSC)

Role of the Committee is to:

  • achieve optimal phase I and phase II trial designs for the most promising agents;
  • increase the predictive value of early phase trials, in order to design more successful phase III trials.

Symptom Management and Health-Related Quality of Life Steering Committee (SxQOL)

Role of the Committee is to:

  • review and prioritize symptom management intervention clinical trial concepts to be conducted through the CCOP mechanism;
  • provide input to studies with secondary quality-of-life (QOL) endpoints in cooperative group treatment studies;
  • develop prioritization criteria for QOL studies that are eligible for proposed correlative science/QOL set aside funds.

Patient Advocate Steering Committee (PASC)

Role of the Committee is to:

  • develop and share best practices for patient advocates in Scientific Steering Committees;
  • identify common concerns and needs and propose potential solutions to address theses concerns;
  • disseminate Scientific Steering Committee information to the appropriate communities;
  • ensure that the concept evaluations consider the patient community at large, with a special focus on minority and underserved populations.

Clinical Imaging Steering Committee (CISC)

Role of the Committee is to:

  • identify and promote the "Best Science" by addressing the design and prioritization of phase III and large phase II trials focused primarily on cancer imaging;
  • serve as a forum for the extramural imaging and oncology communities to provide strategic input to NCI regarding its significant investment in imaging activities in clinical trials;
  • provide valuable imaging expertise for other steering committees' evaluations of therapeutic concepts and discussions that include an imaging component.

Clinical Trials Planning Meetings (CTPMs)

The goal of CTPMs is to:

  • identify strategic directions for clinical trials in a specific field
    • reach consensus on the most important clinical trials to conduct;
    • identify portfolio gaps and emerging scientific opportunities;
    • identify innovative trial design opportunities;
  • facilitate innovation and collaboration among the broad oncology community active in the specific cancer under study

CTPM Executive Summaries:

CTPM Publications: