I apologize for the lack of posts but I just returned from Virginia where I served as an ad hoc reviewer for U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command (USAMRMC) Prostate Cancer Research Program (PCRP) aka the Congressionally Directed medical Research Program. We spent two very intensive days reviewing prostate cancer research grant applications from both seasoned and new investigators. I am now back!

This year the program was allocated only 80 million dollars, which has been flat for the last five years. I encourage you to search this blog for additional information about this program. Besides being a vital system to fund prostate cancer research it has the distinction of being a program that relies very heavily on input from consumers, men with prostate cancer.

Malecare sent five men to the scientific review sessions this year. The research can not reviewed and ultimately funded without input from us, consumers. I want to encourage anyone who might be interested in serving on a review panel next year to contact me. I also will be asking that when congress is doing budget appropriations that you contact your members of congress and ask them to support this program.

**** What I do need to ask everyone is to post a comment on the ABC News Pink White House story at the link below. This is a story about lighting the White House pink for breast cancer awareness. Despite our request for the last two years, the White House has not acknowledged prostate cancer during September (which is Prostate Cancer Awareness month).

Post to ABC News Blog

Darryl Mittledorf from Malecare and Dan Zenka from the Prostate Cancer Foundation have posted to this blog and their comments have vanished…! We need to let our voices be heard, so please go to the site and post your comments.

Joel T Nowak, M.A., M.S.W.