Prospective medical assessment of adults surviving childhood cancer: study design, cohort characteristics, and feasibility of the St. Jude Lifetime Cohort study.

BACKGROUND: To facilitate prospective medical assessment of adults surviving pediatric malignancies and advance knowledge about long-term childhood cancer survivor health, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital (SJCRH) is establishing a lifetime cohort of survivors.
METHODS: Eligibility criteria for inclusion in the St. Jude Lifetime Cohort (SJLIFE) study include: (1) diagnosis of childhood malignancy treated at SJCRH; (2) survival ≥ 10 years from diagnosis; and (3) current age ≥ 18 years. Three levels of participation are offered: (1) comprehensive evaluation on SJCRH campus; (2) limited home evaluation; or (3) completion of health surveys only. A systematic recruitment structure based upon blocks of 50 patients initially focused on leukemia and lymphoma survivors and patients eligible for pilot studies.
RESULTS: As of January 1, 2010, 1,625 (42%) of 3,900 eligible ≥ 10-year survivors have been contacted. Among the first 1,000 potentially eligible survivors selected for recruitment, 971 were subsequently confirmed to fulfill eligibility criteria. To date, 898/971 (92.5%) have been successfully contacted of whom 825 (91.8%) have agreed to participate. Among participants, 88.6% agreed to comprehensive medical evaluation, 0.4% limited local evaluation, and 11.0% survey only. Anticipated minimum overall participation rate for medical evaluation is 75.3% (731/971). Comparison of those contacted who agreed versus declined to participate revealed a greater proportion of males who declined participation (P = 0.001).
CONCLUSIONS: Early results of the SJLIFE study support its feasibility to recruit aging childhood cancer survivors to research investigations evaluating late health outcomes by medical assessments.