Linda Fleisher, PhD, MPH

Fox Chase Cancer Center

Vice Chair of National Navigation Roundtable

Dr. Fleisher is an Associate Research Professor at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, PA.  She has been involved in patient education and navigation for over 30 years directing one of the regional offices of the NCI’s Cancer Information Service, establishing the Fox Chase Cancer Center Resource Education Center, the PA Patient Navigation Demonstration Project and other research projects integrating patient navigation.    Her roles as Project Director and Principal Investigator for the NCI’s Cancer Information Service for over 17 years, serving over ½ million callers with in-depth information and resources addressing the continuum of cancer prevention, risk, detection, treatment and survivorship and the regional partnership program focused on building collaborative initiatives to address health disparities have been the foundation of her current work.   Her research has focused on the intersection of evidence-based cancer control, health disparities and implementation science with the goal to conduct real world research that can be integrated and sustained in cancer care.  She has served on the Academy of Oncology Nurse and Patient Navigation Leadership Council and the National Navigation Roundtable Steering Committee for over 10 years providing support to a number of initiatives to advance oncology navigation.

Dr. Fleisher is honored to serve as the Co-Chair for the National Patient Navigator Roundtable of the of the American Cancer Society.

Andrea Dwyer, BS

University of Colorado

Chair of National Navigation Roundtable

National Navigation Roundtable Andrea (Andi) Dwyer is the Co-Director of the Colorado Colorectal Screening Program at the University of Colorado Cancer Center and Program Director at the Colorado School of Public Health. She has worked for nearly twelve years in the area of cancer survivorship and colorectal cancer prevention. Andi is also an instructor for the Colorado Patient Navigation Training.

Andi is the Co-Chair of Scientific and Evidence Based Health Interventions and a Steering committee member of the National Colorectal Cancer Roundtable. She also serves as the Director of Health Promotion for Fight Colorectal Cancer, focusing on research and patient education. Ms. Dwyer is honored to serve as Chair for the National Patient Navigator Roundtable of the of the American Cancer Society.

Tracy Battaglia, MD, MPH

Boston University Schools of Medicine and Public Health

Advisor to the Chair, National Navigation Roundtable

Dr. Battaglia is an Associate Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at Boston University Schools of Medicine and Public Health where she is Interim Chief of the Section of General Internal Medicine. She also serves as the Director of the Women’s Health Unit, a national Center of Excellence in Women’s Health where she has achieved national recognition for improving the health of vulnerable women at risk for delays in care. As a practicing internist and breast health specialist at Boston Medical Center, the largest safety net medical center in New England, her approach to health disparities focuses largely on engaging the community as partners in the research process.

She has 17 years of experience designing, implementing and evaluating community-engaged Patient Navigation programs to reduce delays across the continuum of cancer care, including co-leading the Boston site of the NCI’s national Patient Navigation Research Program in which we recruited over 3,000 participants from Boston’s low-income populations accounting for nearly 30% of the data to the national database. The American Cancer Society and the Patient Center Outcomes Research Institute support her research to study innovations in the delivery of patient navigation for low income cancer patients.

As Director of the Community Engagement Program for the Boston University Clinical and Translational Science Award, she is leading a cooperative study funded by the National Center to Advance Translational Science (NCATS) in partnership with the four Massachusetts Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA)hubs (Boston University, Harvard University, Tufts University and University of Massachusetts) to support a City-wide dissemination study to reduce breast cancer disparities through a patient navigation network. Dr. Battaglia is also long-time volunteer leader for the American Cancer Society, where she recently served as Chair for the New England Division Board of Directors.