COPE-care

A cancer diagnosis is not only a medical event; it is a deeply disruptive life experience that affects emotional well-being, family relationships, financial stability, and a person’s sense of identity and future. Patients and their families often face anxiety, depression, grief, and uncertainty while navigating complex medical systems. Although many cancer centers recognize the importance of behavioral health, structured psychosocial support remains uneven and, in many cases, difficult for patients to access.

The Center for Oncology Psychology Excellence (COPE) was created to help address this gap by training behavioral health providers to better understand and respond to the psychosocial realities of cancer. Over the past decade, COPE has helped prepare clinicians to provide compassionate, evidence-informed care to individuals and families navigating diagnosis, treatment, and survivorship.

With your support, we are now working toward the next phase of this effort: COPE-care (Comprehensive Oncology Psychosocial Excellence in Care). This initiative aims to translate what we have learned through COPE into a structured psychosocial intervention that can be embedded directly within cancer care settings and delivered as part of routine patient-centered care.

Progress to Date

Over the past several months, our team has been laying the research and policy groundwork needed to design a psychosocial intervention that is both evidence-informed and practical for real-world oncology settings.

Policy Landscape Analysis

We are currently conducting a multilevel policy scan examining the federal, state, and accreditation environments that shape behavioral health services in cancer care. This includes reviewing national quality standards, cancer center accreditation requirements, reimbursement structures, and policies related to integrated behavioral health.

One early observation is that many cancer care systems now require screening for patient distress. However, there is often little guidance about what should happen once distress is identified. In other words, patients may be screened for emotional and psychological needs, but structured systems for delivering care in response to those needs are frequently lacking. Another observation includes fragmented funding coverage, definition alignment and poor communication of policy. Our policy analysis is helping identify where COPE-care could align with existing standards while also informing future policy and reimbursement discussions.

Scoping Review of Psychosocial Interventions in Oncology

At the same time, we are conducting a scoping review of psychosocial interventions currently used in cancer care centers and hospital-based oncology programs. The goal is to better understand what approaches are currently being used, how they are delivered, and where gaps remain.

This review is examining several dimensions of psychosocial care, including the types of interventions offered to cancer patients, the settings in which services are delivered (such as oncology clinics, survivorship programs, or hospital systems), the professionals involved in providing care, and the outcomes that are measured—such as depression, anxiety, coping, and quality of life.

Taken together, this work will help us identify evidence-informed practices that can inform the development of COPE-care while also clarifying where patients’ psychosocial needs remain insufficiently addressed.

Emerging Insights

Although this research is still underway, several themes are beginning to emerge.

First, psychosocial distress among cancer patients is widely recognized but often insufficiently addressed.

Second, psychosocial services in cancer care tend to be fragmented.

Finally, workforce capacity remains a major challenge. There is a national shortage of clinicians with specialized training in psychosocial oncology, which limits the ability of cancer centers to provide consistent behavioral health support for patients and families.

Together, these insights reinforce the need for a model like COPE-care—one that integrates psychosocial support directly into oncology care while also expanding the pipeline of clinicians trained to deliver this work.

Designing the COPE-care Model

The findings from our policy analysis and literature review are directly informing the design of the COPE-care intervention.

Next Steps

Over the coming year, our team will focus on several key milestones. We will complete the policy analysis and scoping review currently underway and begin engaging oncology clinicians, patients, and caregivers to help refine the intervention design. We will also develop the pilot protocol and evaluation framework that will guide the first implementation of COPE-care in partner cancer centers.

These steps will position us to test the intervention in real-world oncology settings and gather evidence on its feasibility, impact, and potential for broader adoption.

Looking Ahead

The long-term goal of COPE-care is to help ensure that psychosocial support becomes an integrated and expected component of cancer care rather than an optional add-on.

Your support is making this work possible. We are deeply grateful for your partnership and look forward to sharing future updates as this work continues to evolve.