02-1436. Proposed Collection; Comment Request; California Health Interview Survey-Complementary and Alternative Medicine

SUMMARY:

In compliance with the requirement of section 2506(c)(2)(A) of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, for opportunity for public comment on proposed data collection projects, the National Cancer Institute (NCI), the National Institutes of Health (NIH) will publish periodic summaries of proposed projects to be submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and approval.

PROPOSED COLLECTION:

Title: California Health Interview Survey—Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CHIS-CAM). Type of Information Collection Request: New. Need and Use of Information Collection. The NCI has sponsored a Cancer Control Topical Module (CCTM) to the California Health Interview Survey (CHIS), administered in 2001. The CHIS is a telephone survey designed to provide population-based, standardized health-related data. Initiated by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research, California Department of Health Services, and the Public Health Institute, the survey was unfunded by a number of public and private sources.

The 2001 CHIS CCTM was similar in content to the 2000 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) CCTM and was administered to one sample adult in more than 54,000 households. NCI anticipates comparing the CHIS and NHIS data in order to conduct comparative and pooled analyses that will enable better estimates of health-related behaviors and cancer risk factor for smaller racial/ethnic minority populations.

The CHIS-CAM is a cross-sectional telephone survey nested in the CHIS study population of all adult respondents who agreed to be re-contacted. Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) is a rapidly growing component of prevention and treatment of chronic illness in the United States. Yet the study of cancer has been largely excluded from the existing population-based surveys on CAM due to sample size restrictions, and little reliable information exists on how CAM utilization varies among different ethnic groups and among those with chronic illnesses.

The CHIS-CAM survey will be administered to approximately 2,000 cancer survivors and 6,000 non-cancer adults. It will enable NCI to collect extensive information on CAM, cancer and other chronic illnesses, and link it with the breadth of basic data already collected from the large, racially and ethnically diverse sample of CHIS respondents.

Comprehensive and detailed collection of information on CAM will enable NCI to increase its understanding of how, why, and to what effect CAM is used. The CHIS-CAM survey data will allow NCI to compare individuals who report various types of cancer and other chronic conditions and to determine: (1) The major categories of CAM procedures being used, as well as the specific therapies targeted toward cancer prevention and treatment, (2) how various subgroups in the population (defined by race/ethnicity, gender, age, health status, etc.) compare with regards to CAM procedures being used; (3) to what extent persons with cancer used specific types of CAM before or after diagnoses with cancer, and whether cancer patients used CAM in place of, or in addition to, conventional medical care; (4) whether systematic CAM treatments for cancer might lead to harm or interact with conventional treatments for cancer; and (5) what expenditures people are paying out-of-pocket for CAM procedures. Frequency of Response: One-time. Affected public: Individuals. Types of respondents: U.S. adults. The annual reporting burden is as follows:

Table A—Annualized Burden Estimates for CHIS-CAM Data Collection

Type of respondents	Estimated number of respondents	Estimated no. of responses per respondent	Average burden hours per response	Estimated total annual burden hour requested
U.S. Adults	8,000	1	.35	2,800

There is no annualized cost to respondents. There are no Capital Costs to report. There are no Operating or Maintenance Costs to report.

Request for Comments:

Written comments and/or suggestions from the public and affected agencies are invited on one or more of the following points: (1) Whether the proposed collection of information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of the agency, including whether the information will have practical utility; (2) The accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden of the proposed collection of information including the validity of the methodology and assumptions used; (3) Ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; and (4) Ways to minimize the burden of the collection of information on those who are to respond, including the use of appropriate automated, electronic, mechanical, or other technological collection techniques or other forms of information technology.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

To request more information on the proposed project or to obtain a copy of the data collection plans and instruments, contact Anita Ambs, Project Coordinator, National Cancer Institute, EPN 4106, 6130 Executive Boulevard, Bethesda Maryland 20892-7344, or call non-toll free number [phone] or email your request, including your address to [e-mail].

COMMENTS DUE DATE:

Comments regarding this information collection are best assured of having their full effect if received within 60 days from the date of this publication.

Dated: January 10, 2002.

Reesa L. Nichols,

NCI Project Clearance Liaison.