Officials were hoping for a large turnout for their national cancer prevention study and in the first round of enrollment, community participation more than doubled predictions.

With a goal of 200 participants set for the first series of enrollment in the American Cancer Society’s Cancer Prevention Study 3, the cancer society reported 421 participants, as of Saturday afternoon, according to Stephanie Elder, area director of the ACS. Western Baptist Hospital held screenings for those enrolled in the study last week.

Looking at the links between modern lifestyle choices and cancer, CPS-3 involves participants from across the country, providing health survey data periodically over the course of several decades. Lauren Teras, senior epidemiologist at the ACS, said with a larger study population, more can be gleaned from research.

“One thing we know is that body weight and weight gain increase cancer risk,” she said. “We don’t, however, know if losing weight reduces that risk. Since weight loss (particularly maintained weight loss) is relatively rare in this country, we need a large study population to have enough people to examine questions like this.

“In addition, a large study population allows us to investigate the interplay between factors such as genes, hormones and lifestyle factors.”

If people were not able to enroll for this recent round of screenings, there will be another opportunity Nov. 15-17, at Lourdes hospital.