KU Medical Center Returns to Chanute to Hold Public

Information Meeting on the Southeast Kansas Health Study

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Researchers from the University of Kansas Medical Center and the University of Kansas return to Chanute on Tuesday, March 24, 1998, to hold the community information meeting on the U.S. EPA-funded Southeast Kansas Health Study that was canceled in January because of an ice storm.  The meeting will be held from 6:30 to 9 p.m. in Chanute’s Central Park Pavilion, 101 South Forest Street, and will focus on answering questions and addressing concerns that Chanute and Neosho County residents may have about the study.

The study’s purpose is to look for possible health effects related to the operation of four commercial hazardous waste burners and other potential sources of environmental releases located in the Southeast Kansas communities of Chanute, Coffeyville, Fredonia, and Independence.  Community involvement in the design and performance of the study is a major objective of this important project.  To achieve that end, information meetings will be held in each study community so that researchers will have an opportunity to meet with residents, hear their concerns, discuss with them different aspects of the study, and take into consideration the information they gain from these meetings in developing the study’s final protocol. 

The two-and-one-half-year study, which began September 1, 1997, has three parts--respiratory health, cancer incidence and mortality rates, and environmental monitoring and analysis.  Residents of the study communities will be asked not only to help in developing the study’s final protocol, but also to participate in a health survey and assessment that are key to the project’s respiratory health component.

Researchers have presented the project’s draft protocol to the mayors, city managers, and city commissioners of Chanute, Fredonia, Independence, and Sedan.  The city of Sedan will serve as the study’s control community.   During March and April, study investigators will hold additional information meetings in Fredonia, Coffeyville, and Sedan.

KUMC researchers who will attend the Chanute meeting include H. William Barkman, M.D., M.S.P.H., the study’s principal investigator; William Jewell, M.D., director of the Kansas Cancer Institute at KUMC; John S. Neuberger, Dr.P.H.; J. Thomas Pierce, Ph.D., C.I.H.; and graduate student Mary Brothers, M.D.   KU researchers who will attend the meetings include Dennis D. Lane, Ph.D., leader of the study’s environmental monitoring work; and graduate students Richard Baldauf, M.S., and Ray E. Carter Jr., M.S.

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