OnCo
ideasIdea

Inoculate newly diagnosed patients against common cancer scams

In the first weeks after diagnosis, tell patients plainly what kinds of false claims and expensive unproven clinics they will encounter and how to spot them.

Prebunking (inoculation) is effective in randomised studies for political and health misinformation: explaining manipulation techniques in advance reduces later susceptibility. Newly diagnosed patients are a predictable target of alternative clinics and supplement marketing. The proposal is a short prebunking module (video plus leaflet, delivered by the navigator or nurse) covering the common techniques (testimonials, suppressed-cure narratives, natural-equals-safe, fake experts) and how to raise anything with the team without judgement.

Hypothesis
Prebunked patients show lower susceptibility to unproven therapy claims at three months and are more likely to disclose supplement and alternative therapy use to their team.
Rationale
Technique-based inoculation generalises across claims, which matters because specific scams change constantly.
What would test it
Randomised trial at diagnosis in three centres; primary endpoint susceptibility score and disclosure at three months, secondary spending on unproven therapies.
Maturity
early clinical
Who has to act
clinic
Cost to try
Small (under $1M)
Years to first evidence
1
Bottlenecks it attacks

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