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Time Warp: Fax Machines Still Common in Oncology Practice. Why?
One minute, he’s working on sequencing a tumor genome. The next, he’s sifting through pages of disorganized data from a device that has been around for decades: the fax machine.
“If two doctors’ offices aren’t on the same electronic medical record, one of the main ways to transfer records is still by fax,” said Dr. Lewis, director of gastrointestinal oncology at Intermountain Healthcare in Murray, Utah. “I can go from cutting-edge innovation to relying on, at best, 1980s information technology. It just boggles my mind.”
Dr. Lewis, who has posted about his frustration with fax machines, is far from alone. Oncologists are among the many specialists across the country at the mercy of telecopiers.
According to a 2021 report by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, fax and mail continue to be the most common methods for hospitals and health systems to exchange care record summaries. In 2019, nearly 8 in 10 hospitals used mail or fax to send and receive health information, the report found.
Fax machines are still commonplace across the healthcare spectrum, said Robert Havasy, MS, senior director for informatics strategy at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS). Inertia, cost, and more pressing priorities for hospitals and medical institutions contribute to the technology sticking around, he explained.
“Post-COVID, my guess is we’re still at over 50% of healthcare practices using fax for some reason, on a daily basis,” Mr. Havasy said in an interview. “A lot of hospitals just don’t have the time, the money, or the staff to fix that problem because there’s always something a little higher up the priority chain they need to focus on.”
If, for instance, “you’re going to do a process redesign to reduce hospital total acquired infections, your fax machine replacement might be 10th or 12th on the list. It just never gets up to 1 or 2 because it’s ‘not that much of a problem,’ ” he added.
Or is it?
Administrators may not view fax machines as a top concern, but clinicians who deal with the machines daily see it differently.
“What worries me is we’re taking records out of an electronic storehouse [and] converting them to a paper medium,” Dr. Lewis said. “And then we are scanning into another electronic storehouse. The more steps, the more can be lost.”
And when information is lost, patient care can be compromised.
Slower Workflows, Care Concerns
Although there are no published data on fax machine use in oncology specifically, this outdated technology does come into play in a variety of ways along the cancer care continuum.
Radiation oncologist David R. Penberthy, MD, said patients often seek his cancer center’s expertise for second opinions, and that requires collecting patient records from many different practices.
“Ideally, it would come electronically, but sometimes it does come by fax,” said Dr. Penberthy, program director of radiation oncology at the University of Virginia School of Medicine in Charlottesville. “The quality of the fax is not always the best. Sometimes it’s literally a fax of a fax. You’re reading something that’s very difficult to read.”
Orders for new tests are also typically sent and received via fax temporarily while IT teams work to integrate them into the electronic health record (EHR), Dr. Penberthy said.
Insurers and third-party laboratories often send test results back by fax as well.
“Even if I haven’t actually sent my patient out of our institution, this crucial result may only be entered back into the record as a scanned document from a fax, which is not great because it can get lost in the other results that are reported electronically,” Dr. Lewis said. The risk here is that an ordering physician won’t see these results, which can lead to delayed or overlooked care for patients, he explained.
“To me, it’s like a blind spot,” Dr. Lewis said. “Every time we use a fax, I see it actually as an opportunity for oversight and missed opportunity to collect data.”
Dr. Penberthy said faxing can slow things down at his practice, particularly if he faxes a document to another office but receives no confirmation and has to track down what happened.
As for cybersecurity, data that are in transit during faxing are generally considered secure and compliant with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), said Mr. Havasy of HIMSS. However, the Privacy Rule also requires that data remain secure while at rest, which isn’t always possible, he added.
“That’s where faxes fall down, because generally fax machines are in public, if you will, or open areas in a hospital,” he said. “They just sit on a desk. I don’t know that the next nurse who comes up and looks through that stack was the nurse who was treating the patient.”
Important decisions or results can also be missed when sent by fax, creating headaches for physicians and care problems for patients.
Dr. Lewis recently experienced an insurance-related fax mishap over Memorial Day weekend. He believed his patient had access to the antinausea medication he had prescribed. When Dr. Lewis happened to check the fax machine over the weekend, he found a coverage denial for the medication from the insurer but, at that point, had no recourse to appeal because it was a long holiday weekend.
“Had the denial been sent by an electronic means that was quicker and more readily available, it would have been possible to appeal before the holiday weekend,” he said.
Hematologist Aaron Goodman, MD, encountered a similar problem after an insurer denied coverage of an expensive cancer drug for a patient and faxed over its reason for the denial. Dr. Goodman was not directly notified that the information arrived and didn’t learn about the denial for a week, he said.
“There’s no ‘ding’ in my inbox if something is faxed over and scanned,” said Dr. Goodman, associate professor of medicine at UC San Diego Health. “Once I realized it was denied, I was able to rectify it, but it wasted a week of a patient not getting a drug that I felt would be beneficial for them.”
Broader Health Policy Impacts
The use of outdated technology, such as fax machines, also creates ripple effects that burden the health system, health policy experts say.
Duplicate testing and unnecessary care are top impacts, said Julia Adler-Milstein, PhD, professor of medicine and chief of the division of clinical informatics and digital transformation at the University of California, San Francisco.
Studies show that 20%-30% of the $65 billion spent annually on lab tests is used on unnecessary duplicate tests, and another estimated $30 billion is spent each year on unnecessary duplicate medical imaging. These duplicate tests may be mitigated if hospitals adopt certified EHR technology, research shows.
Still, without EHR interoperability between institutions, new providers may be unaware that tests or past labs for patients exist, leading to repeat tests, said Dr. Adler-Milstein, who researches health IT policy with a focus on EHRs. Patients can sometimes fill in the gaps, but not always.
“Fax machines only help close information gaps if the clinician is aware of where to seek out the information and there is someone at the other organization to locate and transmit the information in a timely manner,” Dr. Adler-Milstein said.
Old technology and poor interoperability also greatly affect data collection for disease surveillance and monitoring, said Janet Hamilton, MPH, executive director for the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists. This issue was keenly demonstrated during the pandemic, Ms. Hamilton said.
“It was tragic, quite honestly,” she said. “There was such an immense amount of data that needed to be moved quickly, and that’s when computers are at their best.”
But, she said, “we didn’t have the level of systems in place to do it well.”
Specifically, the lack of electronic case reporting in place during the pandemic — where diagnoses are documented in the record and then immediately sent to the public health system — led to reports that were delayed, not made, or had missing or incomplete information, such as patients’ race and ethnicity or other health conditions, Ms. Hamilton said.
Incomplete or missing data hampered the ability of public health officials and researchers to understand how the virus might affect different patients.
“If you had a chronic condition like cancer, you were less likely to have a positive outcome with COVID,” Ms. Hamilton said. “But because electronic case reporting was not in place, we didn’t get some of those additional pieces of information. We didn’t have people’s underlying oncology status to then say, ‘Here are individuals with these types of characteristics, and these are the things that happen if they also have a cancer.’”
Slow, but Steady, Improvements
Efforts at the state and federal levels have targeted improved health information exchange, but progress takes time, Dr. Adler-Milstein said.
Most states have some form of health information exchange, such as statewide exchanges, regional health information organizations, or clinical data registries. Maryland is often held up as a notable example for its health information exchange, Dr. Adler-Milstein noted.
According to Maryland law, all hospitals under the jurisdiction of the Maryland Health Care Commission are required to electronically connect to the state-designated health information exchange. In 2012, Maryland became the first state to connect all its 46 acute care hospitals in the sharing of real-time data.
The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act provided federal-enhanced Medicaid matching funds to states through 2021 to support efforts to advance electronic exchange. Nearly all states used these funds, and most have identified other sources to sustain the efforts, according to a recent US Government Accountability Office (GAO) report. However, GAO found that small and rural providers are less likely to have the financial and technological resources to participate in or maintain electronic exchange capabilities.
Nationally, several recent initiatives have targeted health data interoperability, including for cancer care. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Data Modernization Initiative is a multiyear, multi–billion-dollar effort to improve data sharing across the federal and state public health landscape.
Meanwhile, in March 2024, the Biden-Harris administration launched United States Core Data for Interoperability Plus Cancer. The program will define a recommended minimum set of cancer-related data to be included in a patient’s EHR to enhance data exchange for research and clinical care.
EHR vendors are also key to improving the landscape, said Dr. Adler-Milstein. Vendors such as Epic have developed strong sharing capabilities for transmitting health information from site to site, but of course, that only helps if providers have Epic, she said.
“That’s where these national frameworks should help, because we don’t want it to break down by what EHR vendor you have,” she said. “It’s a patchwork. You can go to some places and hear success stories because they have Epic or a state health information exchange, but it’s very heterogeneous. In some places, they have nothing and are using a fax machine.”
Mr. Havasy believes fax machines will ultimately go extinct, particularly as a younger, more digitally savvy generation enters the healthcare workforce. He also foresees that the growing use of artificial intelligence will help eradicate the outdated technology.
But, Ms. Hamilton noted, “unless we have consistent, ongoing, sustained funding, it is very hard to move off [an older] technology that can work. That’s one of the biggest barriers.”
“Public health is about protecting the lives of every single person everywhere,” Ms. Hamilton said, “but when we don’t have the data that comes into the system, we can’t achieve our mission.”
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
One minute, he’s working on sequencing a tumor genome. The next, he’s sifting through pages of disorganized data from a device that has been around for decades: the fax machine.
“If two doctors’ offices aren’t on the same electronic medical record, one of the main ways to transfer records is still by fax,” said Dr. Lewis, director of gastrointestinal oncology at Intermountain Healthcare in Murray, Utah. “I can go from cutting-edge innovation to relying on, at best, 1980s information technology. It just boggles my mind.”
Dr. Lewis, who has posted about his frustration with fax machines, is far from alone. Oncologists are among the many specialists across the country at the mercy of telecopiers.
According to a 2021 report by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, fax and mail continue to be the most common methods for hospitals and health systems to exchange care record summaries. In 2019, nearly 8 in 10 hospitals used mail or fax to send and receive health information, the report found.
Fax machines are still commonplace across the healthcare spectrum, said Robert Havasy, MS, senior director for informatics strategy at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS). Inertia, cost, and more pressing priorities for hospitals and medical institutions contribute to the technology sticking around, he explained.
“Post-COVID, my guess is we’re still at over 50% of healthcare practices using fax for some reason, on a daily basis,” Mr. Havasy said in an interview. “A lot of hospitals just don’t have the time, the money, or the staff to fix that problem because there’s always something a little higher up the priority chain they need to focus on.”
If, for instance, “you’re going to do a process redesign to reduce hospital total acquired infections, your fax machine replacement might be 10th or 12th on the list. It just never gets up to 1 or 2 because it’s ‘not that much of a problem,’ ” he added.
Or is it?
Administrators may not view fax machines as a top concern, but clinicians who deal with the machines daily see it differently.
“What worries me is we’re taking records out of an electronic storehouse [and] converting them to a paper medium,” Dr. Lewis said. “And then we are scanning into another electronic storehouse. The more steps, the more can be lost.”
And when information is lost, patient care can be compromised.
Slower Workflows, Care Concerns
Although there are no published data on fax machine use in oncology specifically, this outdated technology does come into play in a variety of ways along the cancer care continuum.
Radiation oncologist David R. Penberthy, MD, said patients often seek his cancer center’s expertise for second opinions, and that requires collecting patient records from many different practices.
“Ideally, it would come electronically, but sometimes it does come by fax,” said Dr. Penberthy, program director of radiation oncology at the University of Virginia School of Medicine in Charlottesville. “The quality of the fax is not always the best. Sometimes it’s literally a fax of a fax. You’re reading something that’s very difficult to read.”
Orders for new tests are also typically sent and received via fax temporarily while IT teams work to integrate them into the electronic health record (EHR), Dr. Penberthy said.
Insurers and third-party laboratories often send test results back by fax as well.
“Even if I haven’t actually sent my patient out of our institution, this crucial result may only be entered back into the record as a scanned document from a fax, which is not great because it can get lost in the other results that are reported electronically,” Dr. Lewis said. The risk here is that an ordering physician won’t see these results, which can lead to delayed or overlooked care for patients, he explained.
“To me, it’s like a blind spot,” Dr. Lewis said. “Every time we use a fax, I see it actually as an opportunity for oversight and missed opportunity to collect data.”
Dr. Penberthy said faxing can slow things down at his practice, particularly if he faxes a document to another office but receives no confirmation and has to track down what happened.
As for cybersecurity, data that are in transit during faxing are generally considered secure and compliant with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), said Mr. Havasy of HIMSS. However, the Privacy Rule also requires that data remain secure while at rest, which isn’t always possible, he added.
“That’s where faxes fall down, because generally fax machines are in public, if you will, or open areas in a hospital,” he said. “They just sit on a desk. I don’t know that the next nurse who comes up and looks through that stack was the nurse who was treating the patient.”
Important decisions or results can also be missed when sent by fax, creating headaches for physicians and care problems for patients.
Dr. Lewis recently experienced an insurance-related fax mishap over Memorial Day weekend. He believed his patient had access to the antinausea medication he had prescribed. When Dr. Lewis happened to check the fax machine over the weekend, he found a coverage denial for the medication from the insurer but, at that point, had no recourse to appeal because it was a long holiday weekend.
“Had the denial been sent by an electronic means that was quicker and more readily available, it would have been possible to appeal before the holiday weekend,” he said.
Hematologist Aaron Goodman, MD, encountered a similar problem after an insurer denied coverage of an expensive cancer drug for a patient and faxed over its reason for the denial. Dr. Goodman was not directly notified that the information arrived and didn’t learn about the denial for a week, he said.
“There’s no ‘ding’ in my inbox if something is faxed over and scanned,” said Dr. Goodman, associate professor of medicine at UC San Diego Health. “Once I realized it was denied, I was able to rectify it, but it wasted a week of a patient not getting a drug that I felt would be beneficial for them.”
Broader Health Policy Impacts
The use of outdated technology, such as fax machines, also creates ripple effects that burden the health system, health policy experts say.
Duplicate testing and unnecessary care are top impacts, said Julia Adler-Milstein, PhD, professor of medicine and chief of the division of clinical informatics and digital transformation at the University of California, San Francisco.
Studies show that 20%-30% of the $65 billion spent annually on lab tests is used on unnecessary duplicate tests, and another estimated $30 billion is spent each year on unnecessary duplicate medical imaging. These duplicate tests may be mitigated if hospitals adopt certified EHR technology, research shows.
Still, without EHR interoperability between institutions, new providers may be unaware that tests or past labs for patients exist, leading to repeat tests, said Dr. Adler-Milstein, who researches health IT policy with a focus on EHRs. Patients can sometimes fill in the gaps, but not always.
“Fax machines only help close information gaps if the clinician is aware of where to seek out the information and there is someone at the other organization to locate and transmit the information in a timely manner,” Dr. Adler-Milstein said.
Old technology and poor interoperability also greatly affect data collection for disease surveillance and monitoring, said Janet Hamilton, MPH, executive director for the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists. This issue was keenly demonstrated during the pandemic, Ms. Hamilton said.
“It was tragic, quite honestly,” she said. “There was such an immense amount of data that needed to be moved quickly, and that’s when computers are at their best.”
But, she said, “we didn’t have the level of systems in place to do it well.”
Specifically, the lack of electronic case reporting in place during the pandemic — where diagnoses are documented in the record and then immediately sent to the public health system — led to reports that were delayed, not made, or had missing or incomplete information, such as patients’ race and ethnicity or other health conditions, Ms. Hamilton said.
Incomplete or missing data hampered the ability of public health officials and researchers to understand how the virus might affect different patients.
“If you had a chronic condition like cancer, you were less likely to have a positive outcome with COVID,” Ms. Hamilton said. “But because electronic case reporting was not in place, we didn’t get some of those additional pieces of information. We didn’t have people’s underlying oncology status to then say, ‘Here are individuals with these types of characteristics, and these are the things that happen if they also have a cancer.’”
Slow, but Steady, Improvements
Efforts at the state and federal levels have targeted improved health information exchange, but progress takes time, Dr. Adler-Milstein said.
Most states have some form of health information exchange, such as statewide exchanges, regional health information organizations, or clinical data registries. Maryland is often held up as a notable example for its health information exchange, Dr. Adler-Milstein noted.
According to Maryland law, all hospitals under the jurisdiction of the Maryland Health Care Commission are required to electronically connect to the state-designated health information exchange. In 2012, Maryland became the first state to connect all its 46 acute care hospitals in the sharing of real-time data.
The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act provided federal-enhanced Medicaid matching funds to states through 2021 to support efforts to advance electronic exchange. Nearly all states used these funds, and most have identified other sources to sustain the efforts, according to a recent US Government Accountability Office (GAO) report. However, GAO found that small and rural providers are less likely to have the financial and technological resources to participate in or maintain electronic exchange capabilities.
Nationally, several recent initiatives have targeted health data interoperability, including for cancer care. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Data Modernization Initiative is a multiyear, multi–billion-dollar effort to improve data sharing across the federal and state public health landscape.
Meanwhile, in March 2024, the Biden-Harris administration launched United States Core Data for Interoperability Plus Cancer. The program will define a recommended minimum set of cancer-related data to be included in a patient’s EHR to enhance data exchange for research and clinical care.
EHR vendors are also key to improving the landscape, said Dr. Adler-Milstein. Vendors such as Epic have developed strong sharing capabilities for transmitting health information from site to site, but of course, that only helps if providers have Epic, she said.
“That’s where these national frameworks should help, because we don’t want it to break down by what EHR vendor you have,” she said. “It’s a patchwork. You can go to some places and hear success stories because they have Epic or a state health information exchange, but it’s very heterogeneous. In some places, they have nothing and are using a fax machine.”
Mr. Havasy believes fax machines will ultimately go extinct, particularly as a younger, more digitally savvy generation enters the healthcare workforce. He also foresees that the growing use of artificial intelligence will help eradicate the outdated technology.
But, Ms. Hamilton noted, “unless we have consistent, ongoing, sustained funding, it is very hard to move off [an older] technology that can work. That’s one of the biggest barriers.”
“Public health is about protecting the lives of every single person everywhere,” Ms. Hamilton said, “but when we don’t have the data that comes into the system, we can’t achieve our mission.”
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
One minute, he’s working on sequencing a tumor genome. The next, he’s sifting through pages of disorganized data from a device that has been around for decades: the fax machine.
“If two doctors’ offices aren’t on the same electronic medical record, one of the main ways to transfer records is still by fax,” said Dr. Lewis, director of gastrointestinal oncology at Intermountain Healthcare in Murray, Utah. “I can go from cutting-edge innovation to relying on, at best, 1980s information technology. It just boggles my mind.”
Dr. Lewis, who has posted about his frustration with fax machines, is far from alone. Oncologists are among the many specialists across the country at the mercy of telecopiers.
According to a 2021 report by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, fax and mail continue to be the most common methods for hospitals and health systems to exchange care record summaries. In 2019, nearly 8 in 10 hospitals used mail or fax to send and receive health information, the report found.
Fax machines are still commonplace across the healthcare spectrum, said Robert Havasy, MS, senior director for informatics strategy at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS). Inertia, cost, and more pressing priorities for hospitals and medical institutions contribute to the technology sticking around, he explained.
“Post-COVID, my guess is we’re still at over 50% of healthcare practices using fax for some reason, on a daily basis,” Mr. Havasy said in an interview. “A lot of hospitals just don’t have the time, the money, or the staff to fix that problem because there’s always something a little higher up the priority chain they need to focus on.”
If, for instance, “you’re going to do a process redesign to reduce hospital total acquired infections, your fax machine replacement might be 10th or 12th on the list. It just never gets up to 1 or 2 because it’s ‘not that much of a problem,’ ” he added.
Or is it?
Administrators may not view fax machines as a top concern, but clinicians who deal with the machines daily see it differently.
“What worries me is we’re taking records out of an electronic storehouse [and] converting them to a paper medium,” Dr. Lewis said. “And then we are scanning into another electronic storehouse. The more steps, the more can be lost.”
And when information is lost, patient care can be compromised.
Slower Workflows, Care Concerns
Although there are no published data on fax machine use in oncology specifically, this outdated technology does come into play in a variety of ways along the cancer care continuum.
Radiation oncologist David R. Penberthy, MD, said patients often seek his cancer center’s expertise for second opinions, and that requires collecting patient records from many different practices.
“Ideally, it would come electronically, but sometimes it does come by fax,” said Dr. Penberthy, program director of radiation oncology at the University of Virginia School of Medicine in Charlottesville. “The quality of the fax is not always the best. Sometimes it’s literally a fax of a fax. You’re reading something that’s very difficult to read.”
Orders for new tests are also typically sent and received via fax temporarily while IT teams work to integrate them into the electronic health record (EHR), Dr. Penberthy said.
Insurers and third-party laboratories often send test results back by fax as well.
“Even if I haven’t actually sent my patient out of our institution, this crucial result may only be entered back into the record as a scanned document from a fax, which is not great because it can get lost in the other results that are reported electronically,” Dr. Lewis said. The risk here is that an ordering physician won’t see these results, which can lead to delayed or overlooked care for patients, he explained.
“To me, it’s like a blind spot,” Dr. Lewis said. “Every time we use a fax, I see it actually as an opportunity for oversight and missed opportunity to collect data.”
Dr. Penberthy said faxing can slow things down at his practice, particularly if he faxes a document to another office but receives no confirmation and has to track down what happened.
As for cybersecurity, data that are in transit during faxing are generally considered secure and compliant with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), said Mr. Havasy of HIMSS. However, the Privacy Rule also requires that data remain secure while at rest, which isn’t always possible, he added.
“That’s where faxes fall down, because generally fax machines are in public, if you will, or open areas in a hospital,” he said. “They just sit on a desk. I don’t know that the next nurse who comes up and looks through that stack was the nurse who was treating the patient.”
Important decisions or results can also be missed when sent by fax, creating headaches for physicians and care problems for patients.
Dr. Lewis recently experienced an insurance-related fax mishap over Memorial Day weekend. He believed his patient had access to the antinausea medication he had prescribed. When Dr. Lewis happened to check the fax machine over the weekend, he found a coverage denial for the medication from the insurer but, at that point, had no recourse to appeal because it was a long holiday weekend.
“Had the denial been sent by an electronic means that was quicker and more readily available, it would have been possible to appeal before the holiday weekend,” he said.
Hematologist Aaron Goodman, MD, encountered a similar problem after an insurer denied coverage of an expensive cancer drug for a patient and faxed over its reason for the denial. Dr. Goodman was not directly notified that the information arrived and didn’t learn about the denial for a week, he said.
“There’s no ‘ding’ in my inbox if something is faxed over and scanned,” said Dr. Goodman, associate professor of medicine at UC San Diego Health. “Once I realized it was denied, I was able to rectify it, but it wasted a week of a patient not getting a drug that I felt would be beneficial for them.”
Broader Health Policy Impacts
The use of outdated technology, such as fax machines, also creates ripple effects that burden the health system, health policy experts say.
Duplicate testing and unnecessary care are top impacts, said Julia Adler-Milstein, PhD, professor of medicine and chief of the division of clinical informatics and digital transformation at the University of California, San Francisco.
Studies show that 20%-30% of the $65 billion spent annually on lab tests is used on unnecessary duplicate tests, and another estimated $30 billion is spent each year on unnecessary duplicate medical imaging. These duplicate tests may be mitigated if hospitals adopt certified EHR technology, research shows.
Still, without EHR interoperability between institutions, new providers may be unaware that tests or past labs for patients exist, leading to repeat tests, said Dr. Adler-Milstein, who researches health IT policy with a focus on EHRs. Patients can sometimes fill in the gaps, but not always.
“Fax machines only help close information gaps if the clinician is aware of where to seek out the information and there is someone at the other organization to locate and transmit the information in a timely manner,” Dr. Adler-Milstein said.
Old technology and poor interoperability also greatly affect data collection for disease surveillance and monitoring, said Janet Hamilton, MPH, executive director for the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists. This issue was keenly demonstrated during the pandemic, Ms. Hamilton said.
“It was tragic, quite honestly,” she said. “There was such an immense amount of data that needed to be moved quickly, and that’s when computers are at their best.”
But, she said, “we didn’t have the level of systems in place to do it well.”
Specifically, the lack of electronic case reporting in place during the pandemic — where diagnoses are documented in the record and then immediately sent to the public health system — led to reports that were delayed, not made, or had missing or incomplete information, such as patients’ race and ethnicity or other health conditions, Ms. Hamilton said.
Incomplete or missing data hampered the ability of public health officials and researchers to understand how the virus might affect different patients.
“If you had a chronic condition like cancer, you were less likely to have a positive outcome with COVID,” Ms. Hamilton said. “But because electronic case reporting was not in place, we didn’t get some of those additional pieces of information. We didn’t have people’s underlying oncology status to then say, ‘Here are individuals with these types of characteristics, and these are the things that happen if they also have a cancer.’”
Slow, but Steady, Improvements
Efforts at the state and federal levels have targeted improved health information exchange, but progress takes time, Dr. Adler-Milstein said.
Most states have some form of health information exchange, such as statewide exchanges, regional health information organizations, or clinical data registries. Maryland is often held up as a notable example for its health information exchange, Dr. Adler-Milstein noted.
According to Maryland law, all hospitals under the jurisdiction of the Maryland Health Care Commission are required to electronically connect to the state-designated health information exchange. In 2012, Maryland became the first state to connect all its 46 acute care hospitals in the sharing of real-time data.
The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act provided federal-enhanced Medicaid matching funds to states through 2021 to support efforts to advance electronic exchange. Nearly all states used these funds, and most have identified other sources to sustain the efforts, according to a recent US Government Accountability Office (GAO) report. However, GAO found that small and rural providers are less likely to have the financial and technological resources to participate in or maintain electronic exchange capabilities.
Nationally, several recent initiatives have targeted health data interoperability, including for cancer care. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Data Modernization Initiative is a multiyear, multi–billion-dollar effort to improve data sharing across the federal and state public health landscape.
Meanwhile, in March 2024, the Biden-Harris administration launched United States Core Data for Interoperability Plus Cancer. The program will define a recommended minimum set of cancer-related data to be included in a patient’s EHR to enhance data exchange for research and clinical care.
EHR vendors are also key to improving the landscape, said Dr. Adler-Milstein. Vendors such as Epic have developed strong sharing capabilities for transmitting health information from site to site, but of course, that only helps if providers have Epic, she said.
“That’s where these national frameworks should help, because we don’t want it to break down by what EHR vendor you have,” she said. “It’s a patchwork. You can go to some places and hear success stories because they have Epic or a state health information exchange, but it’s very heterogeneous. In some places, they have nothing and are using a fax machine.”
Mr. Havasy believes fax machines will ultimately go extinct, particularly as a younger, more digitally savvy generation enters the healthcare workforce. He also foresees that the growing use of artificial intelligence will help eradicate the outdated technology.
But, Ms. Hamilton noted, “unless we have consistent, ongoing, sustained funding, it is very hard to move off [an older] technology that can work. That’s one of the biggest barriers.”
“Public health is about protecting the lives of every single person everywhere,” Ms. Hamilton said, “but when we don’t have the data that comes into the system, we can’t achieve our mission.”
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
Cancer Drug Shortages Continue in the US, Survey Finds
Nearly 90% of the 28 NCCN member centers who responded to the survey, conducted between May 28 and June 11, said they were experiencing a shortage of at least one drug.
“Many drugs that are currently in shortage form the backbones of effective multiagent regimens across both curative and palliative treatment settings,” NCCN’s CEO Crystal S. Denlinger, MD, said in an interview.
The good news is that carboplatin and cisplatin shortages have fallen dramatically since 2023. At the peak of the shortage in 2023, 93% of centers surveyed reported experiencing a shortage of carboplatin and 70% were experiencing a shortage of cisplatin, whereas in 2024, only 11% reported a carboplatin shortage and 7% reported a cisplatin shortage.
“Thankfully, the shortages for carboplatin and cisplatin are mostly resolved at this time,” Dr. Denlinger said.
However, all three NCCN surveys conducted in the past year, including the most recent one, have found shortages of various chemotherapies and supportive care medications, which suggests this is an ongoing issue affecting a significant spectrum of generic drugs.
“The acute crisis associated with the shortage of carboplatin and cisplatin was a singular event that brought the issue into the national spotlight,” but it’s “important to note that the current broad drug shortages found on this survey are not new,” said Dr. Denlinger.
In the latest survey, 89% of NCCN centers continue to report shortages of one or more drugs, and 75% said they are experiencing shortages of two or more drugs.
Overall, 57% of centers are short on vinblastine, 46% are short on etoposide, and 43% are short on topotecan. Other common chemotherapy and supportive care agents in short supply include dacarbazine (18% of centers) as well as 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) and methotrexate (14% of centers).
In 2023, however, shortages of methotrexate and 5-FU were worse, with 67% of centers reporting shortages of methotrexate and 26% of 5-FU.
In the current survey, 75% of NCCN centers also noted they were aware of drug shortages within community practices in their area, and more than one in four centers reported treatment delays requiring additional prior authorization.
Cancer drug shortages impact not only routine treatments but also clinical trials. The recent survey found that 43% of respondents said drug shortages disrupted clinical trials at their center. The biggest issues centers flagged included greater administrative burdens, lower patient enrollment, and fewer open trials.
How are centers dealing with ongoing supply issues?
Top mitigation strategies include reducing waste, limiting use of current stock, and adjusting the timing and dosage within evidence-based ranges.
“The current situation underscores the need for sustainable, long-term solutions that ensure a stable supply of high-quality cancer medications,” Alyssa Schatz, MSW, NCCN senior director of policy and advocacy, said in a news release.
Three-quarters (75%) of survey respondents said they would like to see economic incentives put in place to encourage the high-quality manufacturing of medications, especially generic versions that are often in short supply. Nearly two-thirds (64%) cited a need for a broader buffer stock payment, and the same percentage would like to see more information on user experiences with various generic suppliers to help hospitals contract with those engaging in high-quality practices.
The NCCN also continues to work with federal regulators, agencies, and lawmakers to implement long-term solutions to cancer drug shortages.
“The federal government has a key role to play in addressing this issue,” Ms. Schatz said. “Establishing economic incentives, such as tax breaks or manufacturing grants for generic drugmakers, will help support a robust and resilient supply chain — ultimately safeguarding care for people with cancer across the country.”
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
Nearly 90% of the 28 NCCN member centers who responded to the survey, conducted between May 28 and June 11, said they were experiencing a shortage of at least one drug.
“Many drugs that are currently in shortage form the backbones of effective multiagent regimens across both curative and palliative treatment settings,” NCCN’s CEO Crystal S. Denlinger, MD, said in an interview.
The good news is that carboplatin and cisplatin shortages have fallen dramatically since 2023. At the peak of the shortage in 2023, 93% of centers surveyed reported experiencing a shortage of carboplatin and 70% were experiencing a shortage of cisplatin, whereas in 2024, only 11% reported a carboplatin shortage and 7% reported a cisplatin shortage.
“Thankfully, the shortages for carboplatin and cisplatin are mostly resolved at this time,” Dr. Denlinger said.
However, all three NCCN surveys conducted in the past year, including the most recent one, have found shortages of various chemotherapies and supportive care medications, which suggests this is an ongoing issue affecting a significant spectrum of generic drugs.
“The acute crisis associated with the shortage of carboplatin and cisplatin was a singular event that brought the issue into the national spotlight,” but it’s “important to note that the current broad drug shortages found on this survey are not new,” said Dr. Denlinger.
In the latest survey, 89% of NCCN centers continue to report shortages of one or more drugs, and 75% said they are experiencing shortages of two or more drugs.
Overall, 57% of centers are short on vinblastine, 46% are short on etoposide, and 43% are short on topotecan. Other common chemotherapy and supportive care agents in short supply include dacarbazine (18% of centers) as well as 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) and methotrexate (14% of centers).
In 2023, however, shortages of methotrexate and 5-FU were worse, with 67% of centers reporting shortages of methotrexate and 26% of 5-FU.
In the current survey, 75% of NCCN centers also noted they were aware of drug shortages within community practices in their area, and more than one in four centers reported treatment delays requiring additional prior authorization.
Cancer drug shortages impact not only routine treatments but also clinical trials. The recent survey found that 43% of respondents said drug shortages disrupted clinical trials at their center. The biggest issues centers flagged included greater administrative burdens, lower patient enrollment, and fewer open trials.
How are centers dealing with ongoing supply issues?
Top mitigation strategies include reducing waste, limiting use of current stock, and adjusting the timing and dosage within evidence-based ranges.
“The current situation underscores the need for sustainable, long-term solutions that ensure a stable supply of high-quality cancer medications,” Alyssa Schatz, MSW, NCCN senior director of policy and advocacy, said in a news release.
Three-quarters (75%) of survey respondents said they would like to see economic incentives put in place to encourage the high-quality manufacturing of medications, especially generic versions that are often in short supply. Nearly two-thirds (64%) cited a need for a broader buffer stock payment, and the same percentage would like to see more information on user experiences with various generic suppliers to help hospitals contract with those engaging in high-quality practices.
The NCCN also continues to work with federal regulators, agencies, and lawmakers to implement long-term solutions to cancer drug shortages.
“The federal government has a key role to play in addressing this issue,” Ms. Schatz said. “Establishing economic incentives, such as tax breaks or manufacturing grants for generic drugmakers, will help support a robust and resilient supply chain — ultimately safeguarding care for people with cancer across the country.”
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
Nearly 90% of the 28 NCCN member centers who responded to the survey, conducted between May 28 and June 11, said they were experiencing a shortage of at least one drug.
“Many drugs that are currently in shortage form the backbones of effective multiagent regimens across both curative and palliative treatment settings,” NCCN’s CEO Crystal S. Denlinger, MD, said in an interview.
The good news is that carboplatin and cisplatin shortages have fallen dramatically since 2023. At the peak of the shortage in 2023, 93% of centers surveyed reported experiencing a shortage of carboplatin and 70% were experiencing a shortage of cisplatin, whereas in 2024, only 11% reported a carboplatin shortage and 7% reported a cisplatin shortage.
“Thankfully, the shortages for carboplatin and cisplatin are mostly resolved at this time,” Dr. Denlinger said.
However, all three NCCN surveys conducted in the past year, including the most recent one, have found shortages of various chemotherapies and supportive care medications, which suggests this is an ongoing issue affecting a significant spectrum of generic drugs.
“The acute crisis associated with the shortage of carboplatin and cisplatin was a singular event that brought the issue into the national spotlight,” but it’s “important to note that the current broad drug shortages found on this survey are not new,” said Dr. Denlinger.
In the latest survey, 89% of NCCN centers continue to report shortages of one or more drugs, and 75% said they are experiencing shortages of two or more drugs.
Overall, 57% of centers are short on vinblastine, 46% are short on etoposide, and 43% are short on topotecan. Other common chemotherapy and supportive care agents in short supply include dacarbazine (18% of centers) as well as 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) and methotrexate (14% of centers).
In 2023, however, shortages of methotrexate and 5-FU were worse, with 67% of centers reporting shortages of methotrexate and 26% of 5-FU.
In the current survey, 75% of NCCN centers also noted they were aware of drug shortages within community practices in their area, and more than one in four centers reported treatment delays requiring additional prior authorization.
Cancer drug shortages impact not only routine treatments but also clinical trials. The recent survey found that 43% of respondents said drug shortages disrupted clinical trials at their center. The biggest issues centers flagged included greater administrative burdens, lower patient enrollment, and fewer open trials.
How are centers dealing with ongoing supply issues?
Top mitigation strategies include reducing waste, limiting use of current stock, and adjusting the timing and dosage within evidence-based ranges.
“The current situation underscores the need for sustainable, long-term solutions that ensure a stable supply of high-quality cancer medications,” Alyssa Schatz, MSW, NCCN senior director of policy and advocacy, said in a news release.
Three-quarters (75%) of survey respondents said they would like to see economic incentives put in place to encourage the high-quality manufacturing of medications, especially generic versions that are often in short supply. Nearly two-thirds (64%) cited a need for a broader buffer stock payment, and the same percentage would like to see more information on user experiences with various generic suppliers to help hospitals contract with those engaging in high-quality practices.
The NCCN also continues to work with federal regulators, agencies, and lawmakers to implement long-term solutions to cancer drug shortages.
“The federal government has a key role to play in addressing this issue,” Ms. Schatz said. “Establishing economic incentives, such as tax breaks or manufacturing grants for generic drugmakers, will help support a robust and resilient supply chain — ultimately safeguarding care for people with cancer across the country.”
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
Neurofilament Light Chain Detects Early Chemotherapy-Related Neurotoxicity
Investigators found Nfl levels increased in cancer patients following a first infusion of the medication paclitaxel and corresponded to neuropathy severity 6-12 months post-treatment, suggesting the blood protein may provide an early CIPN biomarker.
“Nfl after a single cycle could detect axonal degeneration,” said lead investigator Masarra Joda, a researcher and PhD candidate at the University of Sydney in Australia. She added that “quantification of Nfl may provide a clinically useful marker of emerging neurotoxicity in patients vulnerable to CIPN.”
The findings were presented at the Peripheral Nerve Society (PNS) 2024 annual meeting.
Common, Burdensome Side Effect
A common side effect of chemotherapy, CIPN manifests as sensory neuropathy and causes degeneration of the peripheral axons. A protein biomarker of axonal degeneration, Nfl has previously been investigated as a way of identifying patients at risk of CIPN.
The goal of the current study was to identify the potential link between Nfl with neurophysiological markers of axon degeneration in patients receiving the neurotoxin chemotherapy paclitaxel.
The study included 93 cancer patients. All were assessed at the beginning, middle, and end of treatment. CIPN was assessed using blood samples of Nfl and the Total Neuropathy Score (TNS), the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE) neuropathy scale, and patient-reported measures using the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire–Chemotherapy-Induced Peripheral Neuropathy Module (EORTC-CIPN20).
Axonal degeneration was measured with neurophysiological tests including sural nerve compound sensory action potential (CSAP) for the lower limbs, and sensory median nerve CSAP, as well as stimulus threshold testing, for the upper limbs.
Almost all of study participants (97%) were female. The majority (66%) had breast cancer and 30% had gynecological cancer. Most (73%) were receiving a weekly regimen of paclitaxel, and the remainder were treated with taxanes plus platinum once every 3 weeks. By the end of treatment, 82% of the patients had developed CIPN, which was mild in 44% and moderate/severe in 38%.
Nfl levels increased significantly from baseline to after the first dose of chemotherapy (P < .001), “highlighting that nerve damage occurs from the very beginning of treatment,” senior investigator Susanna Park, PhD, told this news organization.
In addition, “patients with higher Nfl levels after a single paclitaxel treatment had greater neuropathy at the end of treatment (higher EORTC scores [P ≤ .026], and higher TNS scores [P ≤ .00]),” added Dr. Park, who is associate professor at the University of Sydney.
“Importantly, we also looked at long-term outcomes beyond the end of chemotherapy, because chronic neuropathy produces a significant burden in cancer survivors,” said Dr. Park.
“Among a total of 44 patients who completed the 6- to 12-month post-treatment follow-up, NfL levels after a single treatment were linked to severity of nerve damage quantified with neurophysiological tests, and greater Nfl levels at mid-treatment were correlated with worse patient and neurologically graded neuropathy at 6-12 months.”
Dr. Park said the results suggest that NfL may provide a biomarker of long-term axon damage and that Nfl assays “may enable clinicians to evaluate the risk of long-term toxicity early during paclitaxel treatment to hopefully provide clinically significant information to guide better treatment titration.”
Currently, she said, CIPN is a prominent cause of dose reduction and early chemotherapy cessation.
“For example, in early breast cancer around 25% of patients experience a dose reduction due to the severity of neuropathy symptoms.” But, she said, “there is no standardized way of identifying which patients are at risk of long-term neuropathy and therefore, may benefit more from dose reduction. In this setting, a biomarker such as Nfl could provide oncologists with more information about the risk of long-term toxicity and take that into account in dose decision-making.”
For some cancers, she added, there are multiple potential therapy options.
“A biomarker such as NfL could assist in determining risk-benefit profile in terms of switching to alternate therapies. However, further studies will be needed to fully define the utility of NfL as a biomarker of paclitaxel neuropathy.”
Promising Research
Commenting on the research for this news organization, Maryam Lustberg, MD, associate professor, director of the Center for Breast Cancer at Smilow Cancer Hospital and Yale Cancer Center, and chief of Breast Medical Oncology at Yale Cancer Center, in New Haven, Connecticut, said the study “builds on a body of work previously reported by others showing that neurofilament light chains as detected in the blood can be associated with early signs of neurotoxic injury.”
She added that the research “is promising, since existing clinical and patient-reported measures tend to under-detect chemotherapy-induced neuropathy until more permanent injury might have occurred.”
Dr. Lustberg, who is immediate past president of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer, said future studies are needed before Nfl testing can be implemented in routine practice, but that “early detection will allow earlier initiation of supportive care strategies such as physical therapy and exercise, as well as dose modifications, which may be helpful for preventing permanent damage and improving quality of life.”
The investigators and Dr. Lustberg report no relevant financial relationships.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
Investigators found Nfl levels increased in cancer patients following a first infusion of the medication paclitaxel and corresponded to neuropathy severity 6-12 months post-treatment, suggesting the blood protein may provide an early CIPN biomarker.
“Nfl after a single cycle could detect axonal degeneration,” said lead investigator Masarra Joda, a researcher and PhD candidate at the University of Sydney in Australia. She added that “quantification of Nfl may provide a clinically useful marker of emerging neurotoxicity in patients vulnerable to CIPN.”
The findings were presented at the Peripheral Nerve Society (PNS) 2024 annual meeting.
Common, Burdensome Side Effect
A common side effect of chemotherapy, CIPN manifests as sensory neuropathy and causes degeneration of the peripheral axons. A protein biomarker of axonal degeneration, Nfl has previously been investigated as a way of identifying patients at risk of CIPN.
The goal of the current study was to identify the potential link between Nfl with neurophysiological markers of axon degeneration in patients receiving the neurotoxin chemotherapy paclitaxel.
The study included 93 cancer patients. All were assessed at the beginning, middle, and end of treatment. CIPN was assessed using blood samples of Nfl and the Total Neuropathy Score (TNS), the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE) neuropathy scale, and patient-reported measures using the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire–Chemotherapy-Induced Peripheral Neuropathy Module (EORTC-CIPN20).
Axonal degeneration was measured with neurophysiological tests including sural nerve compound sensory action potential (CSAP) for the lower limbs, and sensory median nerve CSAP, as well as stimulus threshold testing, for the upper limbs.
Almost all of study participants (97%) were female. The majority (66%) had breast cancer and 30% had gynecological cancer. Most (73%) were receiving a weekly regimen of paclitaxel, and the remainder were treated with taxanes plus platinum once every 3 weeks. By the end of treatment, 82% of the patients had developed CIPN, which was mild in 44% and moderate/severe in 38%.
Nfl levels increased significantly from baseline to after the first dose of chemotherapy (P < .001), “highlighting that nerve damage occurs from the very beginning of treatment,” senior investigator Susanna Park, PhD, told this news organization.
In addition, “patients with higher Nfl levels after a single paclitaxel treatment had greater neuropathy at the end of treatment (higher EORTC scores [P ≤ .026], and higher TNS scores [P ≤ .00]),” added Dr. Park, who is associate professor at the University of Sydney.
“Importantly, we also looked at long-term outcomes beyond the end of chemotherapy, because chronic neuropathy produces a significant burden in cancer survivors,” said Dr. Park.
“Among a total of 44 patients who completed the 6- to 12-month post-treatment follow-up, NfL levels after a single treatment were linked to severity of nerve damage quantified with neurophysiological tests, and greater Nfl levels at mid-treatment were correlated with worse patient and neurologically graded neuropathy at 6-12 months.”
Dr. Park said the results suggest that NfL may provide a biomarker of long-term axon damage and that Nfl assays “may enable clinicians to evaluate the risk of long-term toxicity early during paclitaxel treatment to hopefully provide clinically significant information to guide better treatment titration.”
Currently, she said, CIPN is a prominent cause of dose reduction and early chemotherapy cessation.
“For example, in early breast cancer around 25% of patients experience a dose reduction due to the severity of neuropathy symptoms.” But, she said, “there is no standardized way of identifying which patients are at risk of long-term neuropathy and therefore, may benefit more from dose reduction. In this setting, a biomarker such as Nfl could provide oncologists with more information about the risk of long-term toxicity and take that into account in dose decision-making.”
For some cancers, she added, there are multiple potential therapy options.
“A biomarker such as NfL could assist in determining risk-benefit profile in terms of switching to alternate therapies. However, further studies will be needed to fully define the utility of NfL as a biomarker of paclitaxel neuropathy.”
Promising Research
Commenting on the research for this news organization, Maryam Lustberg, MD, associate professor, director of the Center for Breast Cancer at Smilow Cancer Hospital and Yale Cancer Center, and chief of Breast Medical Oncology at Yale Cancer Center, in New Haven, Connecticut, said the study “builds on a body of work previously reported by others showing that neurofilament light chains as detected in the blood can be associated with early signs of neurotoxic injury.”
She added that the research “is promising, since existing clinical and patient-reported measures tend to under-detect chemotherapy-induced neuropathy until more permanent injury might have occurred.”
Dr. Lustberg, who is immediate past president of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer, said future studies are needed before Nfl testing can be implemented in routine practice, but that “early detection will allow earlier initiation of supportive care strategies such as physical therapy and exercise, as well as dose modifications, which may be helpful for preventing permanent damage and improving quality of life.”
The investigators and Dr. Lustberg report no relevant financial relationships.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
Investigators found Nfl levels increased in cancer patients following a first infusion of the medication paclitaxel and corresponded to neuropathy severity 6-12 months post-treatment, suggesting the blood protein may provide an early CIPN biomarker.
“Nfl after a single cycle could detect axonal degeneration,” said lead investigator Masarra Joda, a researcher and PhD candidate at the University of Sydney in Australia. She added that “quantification of Nfl may provide a clinically useful marker of emerging neurotoxicity in patients vulnerable to CIPN.”
The findings were presented at the Peripheral Nerve Society (PNS) 2024 annual meeting.
Common, Burdensome Side Effect
A common side effect of chemotherapy, CIPN manifests as sensory neuropathy and causes degeneration of the peripheral axons. A protein biomarker of axonal degeneration, Nfl has previously been investigated as a way of identifying patients at risk of CIPN.
The goal of the current study was to identify the potential link between Nfl with neurophysiological markers of axon degeneration in patients receiving the neurotoxin chemotherapy paclitaxel.
The study included 93 cancer patients. All were assessed at the beginning, middle, and end of treatment. CIPN was assessed using blood samples of Nfl and the Total Neuropathy Score (TNS), the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE) neuropathy scale, and patient-reported measures using the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire–Chemotherapy-Induced Peripheral Neuropathy Module (EORTC-CIPN20).
Axonal degeneration was measured with neurophysiological tests including sural nerve compound sensory action potential (CSAP) for the lower limbs, and sensory median nerve CSAP, as well as stimulus threshold testing, for the upper limbs.
Almost all of study participants (97%) were female. The majority (66%) had breast cancer and 30% had gynecological cancer. Most (73%) were receiving a weekly regimen of paclitaxel, and the remainder were treated with taxanes plus platinum once every 3 weeks. By the end of treatment, 82% of the patients had developed CIPN, which was mild in 44% and moderate/severe in 38%.
Nfl levels increased significantly from baseline to after the first dose of chemotherapy (P < .001), “highlighting that nerve damage occurs from the very beginning of treatment,” senior investigator Susanna Park, PhD, told this news organization.
In addition, “patients with higher Nfl levels after a single paclitaxel treatment had greater neuropathy at the end of treatment (higher EORTC scores [P ≤ .026], and higher TNS scores [P ≤ .00]),” added Dr. Park, who is associate professor at the University of Sydney.
“Importantly, we also looked at long-term outcomes beyond the end of chemotherapy, because chronic neuropathy produces a significant burden in cancer survivors,” said Dr. Park.
“Among a total of 44 patients who completed the 6- to 12-month post-treatment follow-up, NfL levels after a single treatment were linked to severity of nerve damage quantified with neurophysiological tests, and greater Nfl levels at mid-treatment were correlated with worse patient and neurologically graded neuropathy at 6-12 months.”
Dr. Park said the results suggest that NfL may provide a biomarker of long-term axon damage and that Nfl assays “may enable clinicians to evaluate the risk of long-term toxicity early during paclitaxel treatment to hopefully provide clinically significant information to guide better treatment titration.”
Currently, she said, CIPN is a prominent cause of dose reduction and early chemotherapy cessation.
“For example, in early breast cancer around 25% of patients experience a dose reduction due to the severity of neuropathy symptoms.” But, she said, “there is no standardized way of identifying which patients are at risk of long-term neuropathy and therefore, may benefit more from dose reduction. In this setting, a biomarker such as Nfl could provide oncologists with more information about the risk of long-term toxicity and take that into account in dose decision-making.”
For some cancers, she added, there are multiple potential therapy options.
“A biomarker such as NfL could assist in determining risk-benefit profile in terms of switching to alternate therapies. However, further studies will be needed to fully define the utility of NfL as a biomarker of paclitaxel neuropathy.”
Promising Research
Commenting on the research for this news organization, Maryam Lustberg, MD, associate professor, director of the Center for Breast Cancer at Smilow Cancer Hospital and Yale Cancer Center, and chief of Breast Medical Oncology at Yale Cancer Center, in New Haven, Connecticut, said the study “builds on a body of work previously reported by others showing that neurofilament light chains as detected in the blood can be associated with early signs of neurotoxic injury.”
She added that the research “is promising, since existing clinical and patient-reported measures tend to under-detect chemotherapy-induced neuropathy until more permanent injury might have occurred.”
Dr. Lustberg, who is immediate past president of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer, said future studies are needed before Nfl testing can be implemented in routine practice, but that “early detection will allow earlier initiation of supportive care strategies such as physical therapy and exercise, as well as dose modifications, which may be helpful for preventing permanent damage and improving quality of life.”
The investigators and Dr. Lustberg report no relevant financial relationships.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
AT PNS 2024
Oncology Mergers Are on the Rise. How Can Independent Practices Survive?
When he completed his fellowship at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, Moshe Chasky, MD, joined a small five-person practice that rented space from the city’s Jefferson Hospital in Philadelphia. The arrangement seemed to work well for the hospital and the small practice, which remained independent.
Within 10 years, the hospital sought to buy the practice, Alliance Cancer Specialists.
But the oncologists at Alliance did not want to join Jefferson.
The hospital eventually entered into an exclusive agreement with its own medical group to provide inpatient oncology/hematology services at three Jefferson Health–Northeast hospitals and stripped Dr. Chasky and his colleagues of their privileges at those facilities, Medscape Medical News reported last year.
said Jeff Patton, MD, CEO of OneOncology, a management services organization.
A 2020 report from the Community Oncology Alliance (COA), for instance, tracked mergers, acquisitions, and closures in the community oncology setting and found the number of practices acquired by hospitals, known as vertical integration, nearly tripled from 2010 to 2020.
“Some hospitals are pretty predatory in their approach,” Dr. Patton said. If hospitals have their own oncology program, “they’ll employ the referring doctors and then discourage them or prevent them from referring patients to our independent practices that are not owned by the hospital.”
Still, in the face of growing pressure to join hospitals, some community oncology practices are finding ways to survive and maintain their independence.
A Growing Trend
The latest data continue to show a clear trend: Consolidation in oncology is on the rise.
A 2024 study revealed that the pace of consolidation seems to be increasing.
The analysis found that, between 2015 and 2022, the number of medical oncologists increased by 14% and the number of medical oncologists per practice increased by 40%, while the number of practices decreased by 18%.
While about 44% of practices remain independent, the percentage of medical oncologists working in practices with more than 25 clinicians has increased from 34% in 2015 to 44% in 2022. By 2022, the largest 102 practices in the United States employed more than 40% of all medical oncologists.
“The rate of consolidation seems to be rapid,” study coauthor Parsa Erfani, MD, an internal medicine resident at Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Boston, explained.
Consolidation appears to breed more consolidation. The researchers found, for instance, that markets with greater hospital consolidation and more hospital beds per capita were more likely to undergo consolidation in oncology.
Consolidation may be higher in these markets “because hospitals or health systems are buying up oncology practices or conversely because oncology practices are merging to compete more effectively with larger hospitals in the area,” Dr. Erfani told this news organization.
Mergers among independent practices, known as horizontal integration, have also been on the rise, according to the 2020 COA report. These mergers can help counter pressures from hospitals seeking to acquire community practices as well as prevent practices and their clinics from closing.
Although Dr. Erfani’s research wasn’t designed to determine the factors behind consolidation, he and his colleagues point to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and the federal 340B Drug Pricing Program as potential drivers of this trend.
The ACA encouraged consolidation as a way to improve efficiency and created the need for ever-larger information systems to collect and report quality data. But these data collection and reporting requirements have become increasingly difficult for smaller practices to take on.
The 340B Program, however, may be a bigger contributing factor to consolidation. Created in 1992, the 340B Program allows qualifying hospitals and clinics that treat low-income and uninsured patients to buy outpatient prescription drugs at a 25%-50% discount.
Hospitals seeking to capitalize on the margins possible under the 340B Program will “buy all the referring physicians in a market so that the medical oncology group is left with little choice but to sell to the hospital,” said Dr. Patton.
“Those 340B dollars are worth a lot to hospitals,” said David A. Eagle, MD, a hematologist/oncologist with New York Cancer & Blood Specialists and past president of COA. The program “creates an appetite for nonprofit hospitals to want to grow their medical oncology programs,” he told this news organization.
Declining Medicare reimbursement has also hit independent practices hard.
Over the past 15 years, compared with inflation, physicians have gotten “a pay rate decrease from Medicare,” said Dr. Patton. Payers have followed that lead and tried to cut pay for clinicians, especially those who do not have market share, he said. Paying them less is “disingenuous knowing that our costs of providing care are going up,” he said.
Less Access, Higher Costs, Worse Care?
Many studies have demonstrated that, when hospitals become behemoths in a given market, healthcare costs go up.
“There are robust data showing that consolidation increases healthcare costs by reducing competition, including in oncology,” wrote Dr. Erfani and colleagues.
Oncology practices that are owned by hospitals bill facility fees for outpatient chemotherapy treatment, adding another layer of cost, the researchers explained, citing a 2019 Health Economics study.
Another analysis, published in 2020, found that hospital prices for the top 37 infused cancer drugs averaged 86% more per unit than the price charged by physician offices. Hospital outpatient departments charged even more, on average, for drugs — 128% more for nivolumab and 428% more for fluorouracil, for instance.
In their 2024 analysis, Dr. Erfani and colleagues also found that increased hospital market concentration was associated with worse quality of care, across all assessed patient satisfaction measures, and may result in worse access to care as well.
Overall, these consolidation “trends have important implications for cancer care cost, quality, and access,” the authors concluded.
Navigating the Consolidation Trend
In the face of mounting pressure to join hospitals, community oncology practices have typically relied on horizontal mergers to maintain their independence. An increasing number of practices, however, are now turning to another strategy: Management services organizations.
According to some oncologists, a core benefit of joining a management services organization is their community practices can maintain autonomy, hold on to referrals, and benefit from access to a wider network of peers and recently approved treatments such as chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapies.
In these arrangements, the management company also provides business assistance to practices, including help with billing and collection, payer negotiations, supply chain issues, and credentialing, as well as recruiting, hiring, and marketing.
These management organizations, which include American Oncology Network, Integrated Oncology Network, OneOncology, and Verdi Oncology, are, however, backed by private equity. According to a 2022 report, private equity–backed management organizations have ramped up arrangements with community oncology practices over the past few years — a trend that has concerned some experts.
The authors of a recent analysis in JAMA Internal Medicine explained that, although private equity involvement in physician practices may enable operational efficiencies, “critics point to potential conflicts of interest” and highlight concerns that patients “may face additional barriers to both accessibility and affordability of care.”
The difference, according to some oncologists, is their practices are not owned by the management services organization; instead, the practices enter contracts that outline the boundaries of the relationship and stipulate fees to the management organizations.
In 2020, Dr. Chasky’s practice, Alliance Cancer Specialists, joined The US Oncology Network, a management services organization wholly owned by McKesson. The organization provides the practice with capital and other resources, as well as access to the Sarah Cannon Research Institute, so patients can participate in clinical trials.
“We totally function as an independent practice,” said Dr. Chasky. “We make our own management decisions,” he said. For instance, if Alliance wants to hire a new clinician, US Oncology helps with the recruitment. “But at the end of the day, it’s our practice,” he said.
Davey Daniel, MD — whose community practice joined the management services organization OneOncology — has seen the benefits of being part of a larger network. For instance, bispecific therapies for leukemias, lymphomas, and multiple myeloma are typically administered at academic centers because of the risk for cytokine release syndrome.
However, physician leaders in the OneOncology network “came up with a playbook on how to do it safely” in the community setting, said Dr. Daniel. “It meant that we were adopting FDA newly approved therapies in a very short course.”
Being able to draw from a wider pool of expertise has had other advantages. Dr. Daniel can lean on pathologists and research scientists in the network for advice on targeted therapy use. “We’re actually bringing precision medicine expertise to the community,” Dr. Daniel said.
Dr. Chasky and Dr. Eagle, whose practice is also part of OneOncology, said that continuing to work in the community setting has allowed them greater flexibility.
Dr. Eagle explained that New York Cancer & Blood Specialists tries to offer patients an appointment within 2 days of a referral, and it allows walk-in visits.
Dr. Chasky leans into the flexibility by having staff stay late, when needed, to ensure that all patients are seen. “We’re there for our patients at all hours,” Dr. Chasky said, adding that often “you don’t have that flexibility when you work for a big hospital system.”
The bottom line is community oncology can still thrive, said Nick Ferreyros, managing director of COA, “as long as we have a healthy competitive ecosystem where [we] are valued and seen as an important part of our cancer care system.”
A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.
When he completed his fellowship at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, Moshe Chasky, MD, joined a small five-person practice that rented space from the city’s Jefferson Hospital in Philadelphia. The arrangement seemed to work well for the hospital and the small practice, which remained independent.
Within 10 years, the hospital sought to buy the practice, Alliance Cancer Specialists.
But the oncologists at Alliance did not want to join Jefferson.
The hospital eventually entered into an exclusive agreement with its own medical group to provide inpatient oncology/hematology services at three Jefferson Health–Northeast hospitals and stripped Dr. Chasky and his colleagues of their privileges at those facilities, Medscape Medical News reported last year.
said Jeff Patton, MD, CEO of OneOncology, a management services organization.
A 2020 report from the Community Oncology Alliance (COA), for instance, tracked mergers, acquisitions, and closures in the community oncology setting and found the number of practices acquired by hospitals, known as vertical integration, nearly tripled from 2010 to 2020.
“Some hospitals are pretty predatory in their approach,” Dr. Patton said. If hospitals have their own oncology program, “they’ll employ the referring doctors and then discourage them or prevent them from referring patients to our independent practices that are not owned by the hospital.”
Still, in the face of growing pressure to join hospitals, some community oncology practices are finding ways to survive and maintain their independence.
A Growing Trend
The latest data continue to show a clear trend: Consolidation in oncology is on the rise.
A 2024 study revealed that the pace of consolidation seems to be increasing.
The analysis found that, between 2015 and 2022, the number of medical oncologists increased by 14% and the number of medical oncologists per practice increased by 40%, while the number of practices decreased by 18%.
While about 44% of practices remain independent, the percentage of medical oncologists working in practices with more than 25 clinicians has increased from 34% in 2015 to 44% in 2022. By 2022, the largest 102 practices in the United States employed more than 40% of all medical oncologists.
“The rate of consolidation seems to be rapid,” study coauthor Parsa Erfani, MD, an internal medicine resident at Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Boston, explained.
Consolidation appears to breed more consolidation. The researchers found, for instance, that markets with greater hospital consolidation and more hospital beds per capita were more likely to undergo consolidation in oncology.
Consolidation may be higher in these markets “because hospitals or health systems are buying up oncology practices or conversely because oncology practices are merging to compete more effectively with larger hospitals in the area,” Dr. Erfani told this news organization.
Mergers among independent practices, known as horizontal integration, have also been on the rise, according to the 2020 COA report. These mergers can help counter pressures from hospitals seeking to acquire community practices as well as prevent practices and their clinics from closing.
Although Dr. Erfani’s research wasn’t designed to determine the factors behind consolidation, he and his colleagues point to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and the federal 340B Drug Pricing Program as potential drivers of this trend.
The ACA encouraged consolidation as a way to improve efficiency and created the need for ever-larger information systems to collect and report quality data. But these data collection and reporting requirements have become increasingly difficult for smaller practices to take on.
The 340B Program, however, may be a bigger contributing factor to consolidation. Created in 1992, the 340B Program allows qualifying hospitals and clinics that treat low-income and uninsured patients to buy outpatient prescription drugs at a 25%-50% discount.
Hospitals seeking to capitalize on the margins possible under the 340B Program will “buy all the referring physicians in a market so that the medical oncology group is left with little choice but to sell to the hospital,” said Dr. Patton.
“Those 340B dollars are worth a lot to hospitals,” said David A. Eagle, MD, a hematologist/oncologist with New York Cancer & Blood Specialists and past president of COA. The program “creates an appetite for nonprofit hospitals to want to grow their medical oncology programs,” he told this news organization.
Declining Medicare reimbursement has also hit independent practices hard.
Over the past 15 years, compared with inflation, physicians have gotten “a pay rate decrease from Medicare,” said Dr. Patton. Payers have followed that lead and tried to cut pay for clinicians, especially those who do not have market share, he said. Paying them less is “disingenuous knowing that our costs of providing care are going up,” he said.
Less Access, Higher Costs, Worse Care?
Many studies have demonstrated that, when hospitals become behemoths in a given market, healthcare costs go up.
“There are robust data showing that consolidation increases healthcare costs by reducing competition, including in oncology,” wrote Dr. Erfani and colleagues.
Oncology practices that are owned by hospitals bill facility fees for outpatient chemotherapy treatment, adding another layer of cost, the researchers explained, citing a 2019 Health Economics study.
Another analysis, published in 2020, found that hospital prices for the top 37 infused cancer drugs averaged 86% more per unit than the price charged by physician offices. Hospital outpatient departments charged even more, on average, for drugs — 128% more for nivolumab and 428% more for fluorouracil, for instance.
In their 2024 analysis, Dr. Erfani and colleagues also found that increased hospital market concentration was associated with worse quality of care, across all assessed patient satisfaction measures, and may result in worse access to care as well.
Overall, these consolidation “trends have important implications for cancer care cost, quality, and access,” the authors concluded.
Navigating the Consolidation Trend
In the face of mounting pressure to join hospitals, community oncology practices have typically relied on horizontal mergers to maintain their independence. An increasing number of practices, however, are now turning to another strategy: Management services organizations.
According to some oncologists, a core benefit of joining a management services organization is their community practices can maintain autonomy, hold on to referrals, and benefit from access to a wider network of peers and recently approved treatments such as chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapies.
In these arrangements, the management company also provides business assistance to practices, including help with billing and collection, payer negotiations, supply chain issues, and credentialing, as well as recruiting, hiring, and marketing.
These management organizations, which include American Oncology Network, Integrated Oncology Network, OneOncology, and Verdi Oncology, are, however, backed by private equity. According to a 2022 report, private equity–backed management organizations have ramped up arrangements with community oncology practices over the past few years — a trend that has concerned some experts.
The authors of a recent analysis in JAMA Internal Medicine explained that, although private equity involvement in physician practices may enable operational efficiencies, “critics point to potential conflicts of interest” and highlight concerns that patients “may face additional barriers to both accessibility and affordability of care.”
The difference, according to some oncologists, is their practices are not owned by the management services organization; instead, the practices enter contracts that outline the boundaries of the relationship and stipulate fees to the management organizations.
In 2020, Dr. Chasky’s practice, Alliance Cancer Specialists, joined The US Oncology Network, a management services organization wholly owned by McKesson. The organization provides the practice with capital and other resources, as well as access to the Sarah Cannon Research Institute, so patients can participate in clinical trials.
“We totally function as an independent practice,” said Dr. Chasky. “We make our own management decisions,” he said. For instance, if Alliance wants to hire a new clinician, US Oncology helps with the recruitment. “But at the end of the day, it’s our practice,” he said.
Davey Daniel, MD — whose community practice joined the management services organization OneOncology — has seen the benefits of being part of a larger network. For instance, bispecific therapies for leukemias, lymphomas, and multiple myeloma are typically administered at academic centers because of the risk for cytokine release syndrome.
However, physician leaders in the OneOncology network “came up with a playbook on how to do it safely” in the community setting, said Dr. Daniel. “It meant that we were adopting FDA newly approved therapies in a very short course.”
Being able to draw from a wider pool of expertise has had other advantages. Dr. Daniel can lean on pathologists and research scientists in the network for advice on targeted therapy use. “We’re actually bringing precision medicine expertise to the community,” Dr. Daniel said.
Dr. Chasky and Dr. Eagle, whose practice is also part of OneOncology, said that continuing to work in the community setting has allowed them greater flexibility.
Dr. Eagle explained that New York Cancer & Blood Specialists tries to offer patients an appointment within 2 days of a referral, and it allows walk-in visits.
Dr. Chasky leans into the flexibility by having staff stay late, when needed, to ensure that all patients are seen. “We’re there for our patients at all hours,” Dr. Chasky said, adding that often “you don’t have that flexibility when you work for a big hospital system.”
The bottom line is community oncology can still thrive, said Nick Ferreyros, managing director of COA, “as long as we have a healthy competitive ecosystem where [we] are valued and seen as an important part of our cancer care system.”
A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.
When he completed his fellowship at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, Moshe Chasky, MD, joined a small five-person practice that rented space from the city’s Jefferson Hospital in Philadelphia. The arrangement seemed to work well for the hospital and the small practice, which remained independent.
Within 10 years, the hospital sought to buy the practice, Alliance Cancer Specialists.
But the oncologists at Alliance did not want to join Jefferson.
The hospital eventually entered into an exclusive agreement with its own medical group to provide inpatient oncology/hematology services at three Jefferson Health–Northeast hospitals and stripped Dr. Chasky and his colleagues of their privileges at those facilities, Medscape Medical News reported last year.
said Jeff Patton, MD, CEO of OneOncology, a management services organization.
A 2020 report from the Community Oncology Alliance (COA), for instance, tracked mergers, acquisitions, and closures in the community oncology setting and found the number of practices acquired by hospitals, known as vertical integration, nearly tripled from 2010 to 2020.
“Some hospitals are pretty predatory in their approach,” Dr. Patton said. If hospitals have their own oncology program, “they’ll employ the referring doctors and then discourage them or prevent them from referring patients to our independent practices that are not owned by the hospital.”
Still, in the face of growing pressure to join hospitals, some community oncology practices are finding ways to survive and maintain their independence.
A Growing Trend
The latest data continue to show a clear trend: Consolidation in oncology is on the rise.
A 2024 study revealed that the pace of consolidation seems to be increasing.
The analysis found that, between 2015 and 2022, the number of medical oncologists increased by 14% and the number of medical oncologists per practice increased by 40%, while the number of practices decreased by 18%.
While about 44% of practices remain independent, the percentage of medical oncologists working in practices with more than 25 clinicians has increased from 34% in 2015 to 44% in 2022. By 2022, the largest 102 practices in the United States employed more than 40% of all medical oncologists.
“The rate of consolidation seems to be rapid,” study coauthor Parsa Erfani, MD, an internal medicine resident at Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Boston, explained.
Consolidation appears to breed more consolidation. The researchers found, for instance, that markets with greater hospital consolidation and more hospital beds per capita were more likely to undergo consolidation in oncology.
Consolidation may be higher in these markets “because hospitals or health systems are buying up oncology practices or conversely because oncology practices are merging to compete more effectively with larger hospitals in the area,” Dr. Erfani told this news organization.
Mergers among independent practices, known as horizontal integration, have also been on the rise, according to the 2020 COA report. These mergers can help counter pressures from hospitals seeking to acquire community practices as well as prevent practices and their clinics from closing.
Although Dr. Erfani’s research wasn’t designed to determine the factors behind consolidation, he and his colleagues point to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and the federal 340B Drug Pricing Program as potential drivers of this trend.
The ACA encouraged consolidation as a way to improve efficiency and created the need for ever-larger information systems to collect and report quality data. But these data collection and reporting requirements have become increasingly difficult for smaller practices to take on.
The 340B Program, however, may be a bigger contributing factor to consolidation. Created in 1992, the 340B Program allows qualifying hospitals and clinics that treat low-income and uninsured patients to buy outpatient prescription drugs at a 25%-50% discount.
Hospitals seeking to capitalize on the margins possible under the 340B Program will “buy all the referring physicians in a market so that the medical oncology group is left with little choice but to sell to the hospital,” said Dr. Patton.
“Those 340B dollars are worth a lot to hospitals,” said David A. Eagle, MD, a hematologist/oncologist with New York Cancer & Blood Specialists and past president of COA. The program “creates an appetite for nonprofit hospitals to want to grow their medical oncology programs,” he told this news organization.
Declining Medicare reimbursement has also hit independent practices hard.
Over the past 15 years, compared with inflation, physicians have gotten “a pay rate decrease from Medicare,” said Dr. Patton. Payers have followed that lead and tried to cut pay for clinicians, especially those who do not have market share, he said. Paying them less is “disingenuous knowing that our costs of providing care are going up,” he said.
Less Access, Higher Costs, Worse Care?
Many studies have demonstrated that, when hospitals become behemoths in a given market, healthcare costs go up.
“There are robust data showing that consolidation increases healthcare costs by reducing competition, including in oncology,” wrote Dr. Erfani and colleagues.
Oncology practices that are owned by hospitals bill facility fees for outpatient chemotherapy treatment, adding another layer of cost, the researchers explained, citing a 2019 Health Economics study.
Another analysis, published in 2020, found that hospital prices for the top 37 infused cancer drugs averaged 86% more per unit than the price charged by physician offices. Hospital outpatient departments charged even more, on average, for drugs — 128% more for nivolumab and 428% more for fluorouracil, for instance.
In their 2024 analysis, Dr. Erfani and colleagues also found that increased hospital market concentration was associated with worse quality of care, across all assessed patient satisfaction measures, and may result in worse access to care as well.
Overall, these consolidation “trends have important implications for cancer care cost, quality, and access,” the authors concluded.
Navigating the Consolidation Trend
In the face of mounting pressure to join hospitals, community oncology practices have typically relied on horizontal mergers to maintain their independence. An increasing number of practices, however, are now turning to another strategy: Management services organizations.
According to some oncologists, a core benefit of joining a management services organization is their community practices can maintain autonomy, hold on to referrals, and benefit from access to a wider network of peers and recently approved treatments such as chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapies.
In these arrangements, the management company also provides business assistance to practices, including help with billing and collection, payer negotiations, supply chain issues, and credentialing, as well as recruiting, hiring, and marketing.
These management organizations, which include American Oncology Network, Integrated Oncology Network, OneOncology, and Verdi Oncology, are, however, backed by private equity. According to a 2022 report, private equity–backed management organizations have ramped up arrangements with community oncology practices over the past few years — a trend that has concerned some experts.
The authors of a recent analysis in JAMA Internal Medicine explained that, although private equity involvement in physician practices may enable operational efficiencies, “critics point to potential conflicts of interest” and highlight concerns that patients “may face additional barriers to both accessibility and affordability of care.”
The difference, according to some oncologists, is their practices are not owned by the management services organization; instead, the practices enter contracts that outline the boundaries of the relationship and stipulate fees to the management organizations.
In 2020, Dr. Chasky’s practice, Alliance Cancer Specialists, joined The US Oncology Network, a management services organization wholly owned by McKesson. The organization provides the practice with capital and other resources, as well as access to the Sarah Cannon Research Institute, so patients can participate in clinical trials.
“We totally function as an independent practice,” said Dr. Chasky. “We make our own management decisions,” he said. For instance, if Alliance wants to hire a new clinician, US Oncology helps with the recruitment. “But at the end of the day, it’s our practice,” he said.
Davey Daniel, MD — whose community practice joined the management services organization OneOncology — has seen the benefits of being part of a larger network. For instance, bispecific therapies for leukemias, lymphomas, and multiple myeloma are typically administered at academic centers because of the risk for cytokine release syndrome.
However, physician leaders in the OneOncology network “came up with a playbook on how to do it safely” in the community setting, said Dr. Daniel. “It meant that we were adopting FDA newly approved therapies in a very short course.”
Being able to draw from a wider pool of expertise has had other advantages. Dr. Daniel can lean on pathologists and research scientists in the network for advice on targeted therapy use. “We’re actually bringing precision medicine expertise to the community,” Dr. Daniel said.
Dr. Chasky and Dr. Eagle, whose practice is also part of OneOncology, said that continuing to work in the community setting has allowed them greater flexibility.
Dr. Eagle explained that New York Cancer & Blood Specialists tries to offer patients an appointment within 2 days of a referral, and it allows walk-in visits.
Dr. Chasky leans into the flexibility by having staff stay late, when needed, to ensure that all patients are seen. “We’re there for our patients at all hours,” Dr. Chasky said, adding that often “you don’t have that flexibility when you work for a big hospital system.”
The bottom line is community oncology can still thrive, said Nick Ferreyros, managing director of COA, “as long as we have a healthy competitive ecosystem where [we] are valued and seen as an important part of our cancer care system.”
A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.
Doctors Endorsing Products on X May Not Disclose Company Ties
Lead author Aaron Mitchell, MD, MPH, a medical oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, told this news organization that he and his colleagues undertook the study in part to see whether physicians were adhering to professional and industry guidelines regarding marketing communications.
The team reviewed posts by physicians on X during 2022, looking for key words that might indicate that the posts were intended as endorsements of a product. The researchers then delved into the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Open Payments database to see how many of those identified as having endorsed a product were paid by the manufacturers.
What Dr. Mitchell found concerned him, he said.
Overall, the researchers identified 28 physician endorsers who received a total of $1.4 million from sponsors in 2022. Among these, 26 physicians (93%) received payments from the product’s manufacturer, totaling $713,976, and 24 physicians (86%) accepted payments related to the endorsed drug or device, totaling $492,098.
While most did disclose that the posts were sponsored — by adding the word “sponsored” or using #sponsored — nine physicians did not.
Although 28 physician endorsers represent a “small fraction” of the overall number of physicians who use X, each endorsement was ultimately posted dozens, if not hundreds of times, said Dr. Mitchell. In fact, he said he saw the same particular endorsement post every time he opened his X app for months.
Overall, Dr. Mitchell noted that it’s less about the fact that the endorsements are occurring on social media and more that there are these paid endorsements taking place at all.
Among the physician specialties promoting a product, urologists and oncologists dominated. Almost one third were urologists, and 57% were oncologists — six medical oncologists, six radiation oncologists, and four gynecologic oncologists. Of the remaining three physicians, two were internists and one was a pulmonary and critical care medicine specialist.
The authors tracked posts from physicians and industry accounts. Many of the posts on industry accounts were physician testimonials, usually videos. Almost half — 8 of 17 — of those testimonials did not disclose that the doctor was being paid by the manufacturer. In another case, a physician did not disclose that they were paid to endorse a white paper.
Fifteen promotional posts were for a Boston Scientific product, followed by six for GlaxoSmithKline, two for Eisai, two for Exelixis, and one each for AstraZeneca, Novartis, and Pfizer.
In general, Dr. Mitchell said, industry guidelines suggest that manufacturer-paid speakers or consultants should have well-regarded expertise in the area they are being asked to weigh in on, but most physician endorsers in the study were not key opinion leaders or experts.
The authors examined the paid endorsers’ H-index — a measure of academic productivity provided by Scopus. Overall, 19 of the 28 physicians had an H-index below 20, which is considered less accomplished, and 14 had no published research related to the endorsed product.
Ten received payments from manufacturers for research purposes, and only one received research payments related to the endorsed product ($224,577).
“Physicians’ participation in industry marketing raises questions regarding professionalism and their responsibilities as patient advocates,” the JAMA authors wrote.
The study was supported by grants from the National Cancer Institute. Dr. Mitchell reported no relevant financial relationships. Coauthors Samer Al Hadidi, MD, reported receiving personal fees from Pfizer, Sanofi, and Janssen during the conduct of the study, and Timothy S. Anderson, MD, reported receiving grants from the National Institute on Aging, the American Heart Association, and the American College of Cardiology, and receiving consulting fees from the American Medical Student Association. Dr. Anderson is also an associate editor of JAMA Internal Medicine.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
Lead author Aaron Mitchell, MD, MPH, a medical oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, told this news organization that he and his colleagues undertook the study in part to see whether physicians were adhering to professional and industry guidelines regarding marketing communications.
The team reviewed posts by physicians on X during 2022, looking for key words that might indicate that the posts were intended as endorsements of a product. The researchers then delved into the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Open Payments database to see how many of those identified as having endorsed a product were paid by the manufacturers.
What Dr. Mitchell found concerned him, he said.
Overall, the researchers identified 28 physician endorsers who received a total of $1.4 million from sponsors in 2022. Among these, 26 physicians (93%) received payments from the product’s manufacturer, totaling $713,976, and 24 physicians (86%) accepted payments related to the endorsed drug or device, totaling $492,098.
While most did disclose that the posts were sponsored — by adding the word “sponsored” or using #sponsored — nine physicians did not.
Although 28 physician endorsers represent a “small fraction” of the overall number of physicians who use X, each endorsement was ultimately posted dozens, if not hundreds of times, said Dr. Mitchell. In fact, he said he saw the same particular endorsement post every time he opened his X app for months.
Overall, Dr. Mitchell noted that it’s less about the fact that the endorsements are occurring on social media and more that there are these paid endorsements taking place at all.
Among the physician specialties promoting a product, urologists and oncologists dominated. Almost one third were urologists, and 57% were oncologists — six medical oncologists, six radiation oncologists, and four gynecologic oncologists. Of the remaining three physicians, two were internists and one was a pulmonary and critical care medicine specialist.
The authors tracked posts from physicians and industry accounts. Many of the posts on industry accounts were physician testimonials, usually videos. Almost half — 8 of 17 — of those testimonials did not disclose that the doctor was being paid by the manufacturer. In another case, a physician did not disclose that they were paid to endorse a white paper.
Fifteen promotional posts were for a Boston Scientific product, followed by six for GlaxoSmithKline, two for Eisai, two for Exelixis, and one each for AstraZeneca, Novartis, and Pfizer.
In general, Dr. Mitchell said, industry guidelines suggest that manufacturer-paid speakers or consultants should have well-regarded expertise in the area they are being asked to weigh in on, but most physician endorsers in the study were not key opinion leaders or experts.
The authors examined the paid endorsers’ H-index — a measure of academic productivity provided by Scopus. Overall, 19 of the 28 physicians had an H-index below 20, which is considered less accomplished, and 14 had no published research related to the endorsed product.
Ten received payments from manufacturers for research purposes, and only one received research payments related to the endorsed product ($224,577).
“Physicians’ participation in industry marketing raises questions regarding professionalism and their responsibilities as patient advocates,” the JAMA authors wrote.
The study was supported by grants from the National Cancer Institute. Dr. Mitchell reported no relevant financial relationships. Coauthors Samer Al Hadidi, MD, reported receiving personal fees from Pfizer, Sanofi, and Janssen during the conduct of the study, and Timothy S. Anderson, MD, reported receiving grants from the National Institute on Aging, the American Heart Association, and the American College of Cardiology, and receiving consulting fees from the American Medical Student Association. Dr. Anderson is also an associate editor of JAMA Internal Medicine.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
Lead author Aaron Mitchell, MD, MPH, a medical oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, told this news organization that he and his colleagues undertook the study in part to see whether physicians were adhering to professional and industry guidelines regarding marketing communications.
The team reviewed posts by physicians on X during 2022, looking for key words that might indicate that the posts were intended as endorsements of a product. The researchers then delved into the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Open Payments database to see how many of those identified as having endorsed a product were paid by the manufacturers.
What Dr. Mitchell found concerned him, he said.
Overall, the researchers identified 28 physician endorsers who received a total of $1.4 million from sponsors in 2022. Among these, 26 physicians (93%) received payments from the product’s manufacturer, totaling $713,976, and 24 physicians (86%) accepted payments related to the endorsed drug or device, totaling $492,098.
While most did disclose that the posts were sponsored — by adding the word “sponsored” or using #sponsored — nine physicians did not.
Although 28 physician endorsers represent a “small fraction” of the overall number of physicians who use X, each endorsement was ultimately posted dozens, if not hundreds of times, said Dr. Mitchell. In fact, he said he saw the same particular endorsement post every time he opened his X app for months.
Overall, Dr. Mitchell noted that it’s less about the fact that the endorsements are occurring on social media and more that there are these paid endorsements taking place at all.
Among the physician specialties promoting a product, urologists and oncologists dominated. Almost one third were urologists, and 57% were oncologists — six medical oncologists, six radiation oncologists, and four gynecologic oncologists. Of the remaining three physicians, two were internists and one was a pulmonary and critical care medicine specialist.
The authors tracked posts from physicians and industry accounts. Many of the posts on industry accounts were physician testimonials, usually videos. Almost half — 8 of 17 — of those testimonials did not disclose that the doctor was being paid by the manufacturer. In another case, a physician did not disclose that they were paid to endorse a white paper.
Fifteen promotional posts were for a Boston Scientific product, followed by six for GlaxoSmithKline, two for Eisai, two for Exelixis, and one each for AstraZeneca, Novartis, and Pfizer.
In general, Dr. Mitchell said, industry guidelines suggest that manufacturer-paid speakers or consultants should have well-regarded expertise in the area they are being asked to weigh in on, but most physician endorsers in the study were not key opinion leaders or experts.
The authors examined the paid endorsers’ H-index — a measure of academic productivity provided by Scopus. Overall, 19 of the 28 physicians had an H-index below 20, which is considered less accomplished, and 14 had no published research related to the endorsed product.
Ten received payments from manufacturers for research purposes, and only one received research payments related to the endorsed product ($224,577).
“Physicians’ participation in industry marketing raises questions regarding professionalism and their responsibilities as patient advocates,” the JAMA authors wrote.
The study was supported by grants from the National Cancer Institute. Dr. Mitchell reported no relevant financial relationships. Coauthors Samer Al Hadidi, MD, reported receiving personal fees from Pfizer, Sanofi, and Janssen during the conduct of the study, and Timothy S. Anderson, MD, reported receiving grants from the National Institute on Aging, the American Heart Association, and the American College of Cardiology, and receiving consulting fees from the American Medical Student Association. Dr. Anderson is also an associate editor of JAMA Internal Medicine.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
One Patient Changed This Oncologist’s View of Hope. Here’s How.
CHICAGO — Carlos, a 21-year-old, lay in a hospital bed, barely clinging to life. Following a stem cell transplant for leukemia, Carlos had developed a life-threatening case of graft-vs-host disease.
But Carlos’ mother had faith.
“I have hope things will get better,” she said, via interpreter, to Richard Leiter, MD, a palliative care doctor in training at that time.
“I hope they will,” Dr. Leiter told her.
“I should have stopped there,” said Dr. Leiter, recounting an early-career lesson on hope during the ASCO Voices session at the American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting. “But in my eagerness to show my attending and myself that I could handle this conversation, I kept going, mistakenly.”
“But none of us think they will,” Dr. Leiter continued.
Carlos’ mother looked Dr. Leiter in the eye. “You want him to die,” she said.
“I knew, even then, that she was right,” recalled Dr. Leiter, now a palliative care physician at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women’s Hospital and an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, Boston.
Although there was nothing he could do to save Carlos, Dr. Leiter also couldn’t sit with the extreme suffering. “The pain was too great,” Dr. Leiter said. “I needed her to adopt our narrative that we had done everything we could to help him live, and now, we would do everything we could to help his death be a comfortable one.”
But looking back, Dr. Leiter realized, “How could we have asked her to accept what was fundamentally unacceptable, to comprehend the incomprehensible?”
The Importance of Hope
Alan B. Astrow, MD, said during an ASCO symposium on “The Art and Science of Hope.”
“How we think about hope directly influences patient care,” said Dr. Astrow, chief of hematology and medical oncology at NewYork-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital and a professor of clinical medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City.
Hope, whatever it turns out to be neurobiologically, is “very much a gift” that underlies human existence, he said.
Physicians have the capacity to restore or shatter a patient’s hopes, and those who come to understand the importance of hope will wish to extend the gift to others, Dr. Astrow said.
Asking patients about their hopes is the “golden question,” Steven Z. Pantilat, MD, said at the symposium. “When you think about the future, what do you hope for?”
Often, the answers reveal not only “things beyond a cure that matter tremendously to the patient but things that we can help with,” said Dr. Pantilat, professor and chief of the Division of Palliative Medicine at the University of California San Francisco.
Dr. Pantilat recalled a patient with advanced pancreatic cancer who wished to see her daughter’s wedding in 10 months. He knew that was unlikely, but the discussion led to another solution.
Her daughter moved the wedding to the ICU.
Hope can persist and uplift even in the darkest of times, and “as clinicians, we need to be in the true hope business,” he said.
While some patients may wish for a cure, others may want more time with family or comfort in the face of suffering. People can “hope for all the things that can still be, despite the fact that there’s a lot of things that can’t,” he said.
However, fear that a patient will hope for a cure, and that the difficult discussions to follow might destroy hope or lead to false hope, sometimes means physicians won’t begin the conversation.
“We want to be honest with our patients — compassionate and kind, but honest — when we talk about their hopes,” Dr. Pantilat explained. Sometimes that means he needs to tell patients, “I wish that could happen. I wish I had a treatment that could make your cancer go away, but unfortunately, I don’t. So let’s think about what else we can do to help you.”
Having these difficult discussions matters. The evidence, although limited, indicates that feeling hopeful can improve patients’ well-being and may even boost their cancer outcomes.
One recent study found, for instance, that patients who reported feeling more hopeful also had lower levels of depression and anxiety. Early research also suggests that greater levels of hope may have a hand in reducing inflammation in patients with ovarian cancer and could even improve survival in some patients with advanced cancer.
For Dr. Leiter, while these lessons came early in his career as a palliative care physician, they persist and influence his practice today.
“I know that I could not have prevented Carlos’ death. None of us could have, and none of us could have protected his mother from the unimaginable grief that will stay with her for the rest of her life,” he said. “But I could have made things just a little bit less difficult for her.
“I could have acted as her guide rather than her cross-examiner,” he continued, explaining that he now sees hope as “a generous collaborator” that can coexist with rising creatinine levels, failing livers, and fears about intubation.
“As clinicians, we can always find space to hope with our patients and their families,” he said. “So now, years later when I sit with a terrified and grieving family and they tell me they hope their loved one gets better, I remember Carlos’ mother’s eyes piercing mine ... and I know how to respond: ‘I hope so, too.’ And I do.”
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
CHICAGO — Carlos, a 21-year-old, lay in a hospital bed, barely clinging to life. Following a stem cell transplant for leukemia, Carlos had developed a life-threatening case of graft-vs-host disease.
But Carlos’ mother had faith.
“I have hope things will get better,” she said, via interpreter, to Richard Leiter, MD, a palliative care doctor in training at that time.
“I hope they will,” Dr. Leiter told her.
“I should have stopped there,” said Dr. Leiter, recounting an early-career lesson on hope during the ASCO Voices session at the American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting. “But in my eagerness to show my attending and myself that I could handle this conversation, I kept going, mistakenly.”
“But none of us think they will,” Dr. Leiter continued.
Carlos’ mother looked Dr. Leiter in the eye. “You want him to die,” she said.
“I knew, even then, that she was right,” recalled Dr. Leiter, now a palliative care physician at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women’s Hospital and an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, Boston.
Although there was nothing he could do to save Carlos, Dr. Leiter also couldn’t sit with the extreme suffering. “The pain was too great,” Dr. Leiter said. “I needed her to adopt our narrative that we had done everything we could to help him live, and now, we would do everything we could to help his death be a comfortable one.”
But looking back, Dr. Leiter realized, “How could we have asked her to accept what was fundamentally unacceptable, to comprehend the incomprehensible?”
The Importance of Hope
Alan B. Astrow, MD, said during an ASCO symposium on “The Art and Science of Hope.”
“How we think about hope directly influences patient care,” said Dr. Astrow, chief of hematology and medical oncology at NewYork-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital and a professor of clinical medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City.
Hope, whatever it turns out to be neurobiologically, is “very much a gift” that underlies human existence, he said.
Physicians have the capacity to restore or shatter a patient’s hopes, and those who come to understand the importance of hope will wish to extend the gift to others, Dr. Astrow said.
Asking patients about their hopes is the “golden question,” Steven Z. Pantilat, MD, said at the symposium. “When you think about the future, what do you hope for?”
Often, the answers reveal not only “things beyond a cure that matter tremendously to the patient but things that we can help with,” said Dr. Pantilat, professor and chief of the Division of Palliative Medicine at the University of California San Francisco.
Dr. Pantilat recalled a patient with advanced pancreatic cancer who wished to see her daughter’s wedding in 10 months. He knew that was unlikely, but the discussion led to another solution.
Her daughter moved the wedding to the ICU.
Hope can persist and uplift even in the darkest of times, and “as clinicians, we need to be in the true hope business,” he said.
While some patients may wish for a cure, others may want more time with family or comfort in the face of suffering. People can “hope for all the things that can still be, despite the fact that there’s a lot of things that can’t,” he said.
However, fear that a patient will hope for a cure, and that the difficult discussions to follow might destroy hope or lead to false hope, sometimes means physicians won’t begin the conversation.
“We want to be honest with our patients — compassionate and kind, but honest — when we talk about their hopes,” Dr. Pantilat explained. Sometimes that means he needs to tell patients, “I wish that could happen. I wish I had a treatment that could make your cancer go away, but unfortunately, I don’t. So let’s think about what else we can do to help you.”
Having these difficult discussions matters. The evidence, although limited, indicates that feeling hopeful can improve patients’ well-being and may even boost their cancer outcomes.
One recent study found, for instance, that patients who reported feeling more hopeful also had lower levels of depression and anxiety. Early research also suggests that greater levels of hope may have a hand in reducing inflammation in patients with ovarian cancer and could even improve survival in some patients with advanced cancer.
For Dr. Leiter, while these lessons came early in his career as a palliative care physician, they persist and influence his practice today.
“I know that I could not have prevented Carlos’ death. None of us could have, and none of us could have protected his mother from the unimaginable grief that will stay with her for the rest of her life,” he said. “But I could have made things just a little bit less difficult for her.
“I could have acted as her guide rather than her cross-examiner,” he continued, explaining that he now sees hope as “a generous collaborator” that can coexist with rising creatinine levels, failing livers, and fears about intubation.
“As clinicians, we can always find space to hope with our patients and their families,” he said. “So now, years later when I sit with a terrified and grieving family and they tell me they hope their loved one gets better, I remember Carlos’ mother’s eyes piercing mine ... and I know how to respond: ‘I hope so, too.’ And I do.”
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
CHICAGO — Carlos, a 21-year-old, lay in a hospital bed, barely clinging to life. Following a stem cell transplant for leukemia, Carlos had developed a life-threatening case of graft-vs-host disease.
But Carlos’ mother had faith.
“I have hope things will get better,” she said, via interpreter, to Richard Leiter, MD, a palliative care doctor in training at that time.
“I hope they will,” Dr. Leiter told her.
“I should have stopped there,” said Dr. Leiter, recounting an early-career lesson on hope during the ASCO Voices session at the American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting. “But in my eagerness to show my attending and myself that I could handle this conversation, I kept going, mistakenly.”
“But none of us think they will,” Dr. Leiter continued.
Carlos’ mother looked Dr. Leiter in the eye. “You want him to die,” she said.
“I knew, even then, that she was right,” recalled Dr. Leiter, now a palliative care physician at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women’s Hospital and an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, Boston.
Although there was nothing he could do to save Carlos, Dr. Leiter also couldn’t sit with the extreme suffering. “The pain was too great,” Dr. Leiter said. “I needed her to adopt our narrative that we had done everything we could to help him live, and now, we would do everything we could to help his death be a comfortable one.”
But looking back, Dr. Leiter realized, “How could we have asked her to accept what was fundamentally unacceptable, to comprehend the incomprehensible?”
The Importance of Hope
Alan B. Astrow, MD, said during an ASCO symposium on “The Art and Science of Hope.”
“How we think about hope directly influences patient care,” said Dr. Astrow, chief of hematology and medical oncology at NewYork-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital and a professor of clinical medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City.
Hope, whatever it turns out to be neurobiologically, is “very much a gift” that underlies human existence, he said.
Physicians have the capacity to restore or shatter a patient’s hopes, and those who come to understand the importance of hope will wish to extend the gift to others, Dr. Astrow said.
Asking patients about their hopes is the “golden question,” Steven Z. Pantilat, MD, said at the symposium. “When you think about the future, what do you hope for?”
Often, the answers reveal not only “things beyond a cure that matter tremendously to the patient but things that we can help with,” said Dr. Pantilat, professor and chief of the Division of Palliative Medicine at the University of California San Francisco.
Dr. Pantilat recalled a patient with advanced pancreatic cancer who wished to see her daughter’s wedding in 10 months. He knew that was unlikely, but the discussion led to another solution.
Her daughter moved the wedding to the ICU.
Hope can persist and uplift even in the darkest of times, and “as clinicians, we need to be in the true hope business,” he said.
While some patients may wish for a cure, others may want more time with family or comfort in the face of suffering. People can “hope for all the things that can still be, despite the fact that there’s a lot of things that can’t,” he said.
However, fear that a patient will hope for a cure, and that the difficult discussions to follow might destroy hope or lead to false hope, sometimes means physicians won’t begin the conversation.
“We want to be honest with our patients — compassionate and kind, but honest — when we talk about their hopes,” Dr. Pantilat explained. Sometimes that means he needs to tell patients, “I wish that could happen. I wish I had a treatment that could make your cancer go away, but unfortunately, I don’t. So let’s think about what else we can do to help you.”
Having these difficult discussions matters. The evidence, although limited, indicates that feeling hopeful can improve patients’ well-being and may even boost their cancer outcomes.
One recent study found, for instance, that patients who reported feeling more hopeful also had lower levels of depression and anxiety. Early research also suggests that greater levels of hope may have a hand in reducing inflammation in patients with ovarian cancer and could even improve survival in some patients with advanced cancer.
For Dr. Leiter, while these lessons came early in his career as a palliative care physician, they persist and influence his practice today.
“I know that I could not have prevented Carlos’ death. None of us could have, and none of us could have protected his mother from the unimaginable grief that will stay with her for the rest of her life,” he said. “But I could have made things just a little bit less difficult for her.
“I could have acted as her guide rather than her cross-examiner,” he continued, explaining that he now sees hope as “a generous collaborator” that can coexist with rising creatinine levels, failing livers, and fears about intubation.
“As clinicians, we can always find space to hope with our patients and their families,” he said. “So now, years later when I sit with a terrified and grieving family and they tell me they hope their loved one gets better, I remember Carlos’ mother’s eyes piercing mine ... and I know how to respond: ‘I hope so, too.’ And I do.”
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
FROM ASCO 2024
FDA Expands Repotrectinib Label to All NTRK Gene Fusion+ Solid Tumors
The approval is a label expansion for the tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI), which received initial clearance in November 2023 for locally advanced or metastatic ROS1-positive non–small cell lung cancer.
NTRK gene fusions are genetic abnormalities wherein part of the NTRK gene fuses with an unrelated gene. The abnormal gene can then produce an oncogenic protein. Although rare, these mutations are found in many cancer types.
The approval, for adult and pediatric patients aged 12 years or older, was based on the single-arm open-label TRIDENT-1 trial in 88 adults with locally advanced or metastatic NTRK gene fusion solid tumors.
In the 40 patients who were TKI-naive, the overall response rate was 58%, and the median duration of response was not estimable. In the 48 patients who had a TKI previously, the overall response rate was 50% and median duration of response was 9.9 months.
In 20% or more of participants, treatment caused dizziness, dysgeusia, peripheral neuropathy, constipation, dyspnea, fatigue, ataxia, cognitive impairment, muscular weakness, and nausea.
Labeling warns of central nervous system reactions, interstitial lung disease/pneumonitis, hepatotoxicity, myalgia with creatine phosphokinase elevation, hyperuricemia, bone fractures, and embryo-fetal toxicity.
The recommended dose is 160 mg orally once daily for 14 days then increased to 160 mg twice daily until disease progression or unacceptable toxicity.
Sixty 40-mg capsules cost around $7,644, according to drugs.com.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
The approval is a label expansion for the tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI), which received initial clearance in November 2023 for locally advanced or metastatic ROS1-positive non–small cell lung cancer.
NTRK gene fusions are genetic abnormalities wherein part of the NTRK gene fuses with an unrelated gene. The abnormal gene can then produce an oncogenic protein. Although rare, these mutations are found in many cancer types.
The approval, for adult and pediatric patients aged 12 years or older, was based on the single-arm open-label TRIDENT-1 trial in 88 adults with locally advanced or metastatic NTRK gene fusion solid tumors.
In the 40 patients who were TKI-naive, the overall response rate was 58%, and the median duration of response was not estimable. In the 48 patients who had a TKI previously, the overall response rate was 50% and median duration of response was 9.9 months.
In 20% or more of participants, treatment caused dizziness, dysgeusia, peripheral neuropathy, constipation, dyspnea, fatigue, ataxia, cognitive impairment, muscular weakness, and nausea.
Labeling warns of central nervous system reactions, interstitial lung disease/pneumonitis, hepatotoxicity, myalgia with creatine phosphokinase elevation, hyperuricemia, bone fractures, and embryo-fetal toxicity.
The recommended dose is 160 mg orally once daily for 14 days then increased to 160 mg twice daily until disease progression or unacceptable toxicity.
Sixty 40-mg capsules cost around $7,644, according to drugs.com.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
The approval is a label expansion for the tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI), which received initial clearance in November 2023 for locally advanced or metastatic ROS1-positive non–small cell lung cancer.
NTRK gene fusions are genetic abnormalities wherein part of the NTRK gene fuses with an unrelated gene. The abnormal gene can then produce an oncogenic protein. Although rare, these mutations are found in many cancer types.
The approval, for adult and pediatric patients aged 12 years or older, was based on the single-arm open-label TRIDENT-1 trial in 88 adults with locally advanced or metastatic NTRK gene fusion solid tumors.
In the 40 patients who were TKI-naive, the overall response rate was 58%, and the median duration of response was not estimable. In the 48 patients who had a TKI previously, the overall response rate was 50% and median duration of response was 9.9 months.
In 20% or more of participants, treatment caused dizziness, dysgeusia, peripheral neuropathy, constipation, dyspnea, fatigue, ataxia, cognitive impairment, muscular weakness, and nausea.
Labeling warns of central nervous system reactions, interstitial lung disease/pneumonitis, hepatotoxicity, myalgia with creatine phosphokinase elevation, hyperuricemia, bone fractures, and embryo-fetal toxicity.
The recommended dose is 160 mg orally once daily for 14 days then increased to 160 mg twice daily until disease progression or unacceptable toxicity.
Sixty 40-mg capsules cost around $7,644, according to drugs.com.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
Are Children Born Through ART at Higher Risk for Cancer?
The results of a large French study comparing the cancer risk in children conceived through assisted reproductive technology (ART) with that of naturally conceived children were published recently in JAMA Network Open. This study is one of the largest to date on this subject: It included 8,526,306 children born in France between 2010 and 2021, of whom 260,236 (3%) were conceived through ART, and followed them up to a median age of 6.7 years.
Motivations for the Study
ART (including artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization [IVF], or intracytoplasmic sperm injection [ICSI] with fresh or frozen embryo transfer) accounts for about 1 in 30 births in France. However, limited and heterogeneous data have suggested an increased risk for certain health disorders, including cancer, among children conceived through ART. Therefore, a large-scale evaluation of cancer risk in these children is important.
No Overall Increase
In all, 9256 children developed cancer, including 292 who were conceived through ART. Thus, Nevertheless, a slight increase in the risk for leukemia was observed in children conceived through IVF or ICSI. The investigators observed approximately one additional case for every 5000 newborns conceived through IVF or ICSI who reached age 10 years.
Epidemiological monitoring should be continued to better evaluate long-term risks and see whether the risk for leukemia is confirmed. If it is, then it will be useful to investigate the mechanisms related to ART techniques or the fertility disorders of parents that could lead to an increased risk for leukemia.
This story was translated from Univadis France, which is part of the Medscape Professional Network, using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication. A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
The results of a large French study comparing the cancer risk in children conceived through assisted reproductive technology (ART) with that of naturally conceived children were published recently in JAMA Network Open. This study is one of the largest to date on this subject: It included 8,526,306 children born in France between 2010 and 2021, of whom 260,236 (3%) were conceived through ART, and followed them up to a median age of 6.7 years.
Motivations for the Study
ART (including artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization [IVF], or intracytoplasmic sperm injection [ICSI] with fresh or frozen embryo transfer) accounts for about 1 in 30 births in France. However, limited and heterogeneous data have suggested an increased risk for certain health disorders, including cancer, among children conceived through ART. Therefore, a large-scale evaluation of cancer risk in these children is important.
No Overall Increase
In all, 9256 children developed cancer, including 292 who were conceived through ART. Thus, Nevertheless, a slight increase in the risk for leukemia was observed in children conceived through IVF or ICSI. The investigators observed approximately one additional case for every 5000 newborns conceived through IVF or ICSI who reached age 10 years.
Epidemiological monitoring should be continued to better evaluate long-term risks and see whether the risk for leukemia is confirmed. If it is, then it will be useful to investigate the mechanisms related to ART techniques or the fertility disorders of parents that could lead to an increased risk for leukemia.
This story was translated from Univadis France, which is part of the Medscape Professional Network, using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication. A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
The results of a large French study comparing the cancer risk in children conceived through assisted reproductive technology (ART) with that of naturally conceived children were published recently in JAMA Network Open. This study is one of the largest to date on this subject: It included 8,526,306 children born in France between 2010 and 2021, of whom 260,236 (3%) were conceived through ART, and followed them up to a median age of 6.7 years.
Motivations for the Study
ART (including artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization [IVF], or intracytoplasmic sperm injection [ICSI] with fresh or frozen embryo transfer) accounts for about 1 in 30 births in France. However, limited and heterogeneous data have suggested an increased risk for certain health disorders, including cancer, among children conceived through ART. Therefore, a large-scale evaluation of cancer risk in these children is important.
No Overall Increase
In all, 9256 children developed cancer, including 292 who were conceived through ART. Thus, Nevertheless, a slight increase in the risk for leukemia was observed in children conceived through IVF or ICSI. The investigators observed approximately one additional case for every 5000 newborns conceived through IVF or ICSI who reached age 10 years.
Epidemiological monitoring should be continued to better evaluate long-term risks and see whether the risk for leukemia is confirmed. If it is, then it will be useful to investigate the mechanisms related to ART techniques or the fertility disorders of parents that could lead to an increased risk for leukemia.
This story was translated from Univadis France, which is part of the Medscape Professional Network, using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication. A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.
The ASCO Annual Meeting Starts This Week
From its origins in 1964, ASCO’s annual event has grown to become the world’s largest clinical oncology meeting, drawing attendees from across the globe.
More than 7000 abstracts were submitted for this year’s meeting a new record — and over 5000 were selected for presentation.
This year’s chair of the Annual Meeting Education Committee, Thomas William LeBlanc, MD, told us he has been attending the meeting since his training days more than a decade ago.
The event is “just incredibly empowering and energizing,” Dr. LeBlanc said, with opportunities to catch up with old colleagues and meet new ones, learn how far oncology has come and where it’s headed, and hear clinical pearls to take back the clinic.
This year’s theme, selected by ASCO President Lynn M. Schuchter, MD, is “The Art and Science of Cancer Care: From Comfort to Cure.”
Dr. LeBlanc, a blood cancer specialist at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, said the theme has been woven throughout the abstract and educational sessions. Most sessions will have at least one presentation related to how we support people — not only “when we cure them but also when we can’t cure them,” he said.
Topics will include patient well-being, comfort measures, and survivorship. And for the first time the plenary session will include a palliative care abstract that addresses whether or not palliative care can be delivered effectively through telemedicine. The session is on Sunday, June 2.
Other potentially practice changing plenary abstracts tackle immunotherapy combinations for resectable melanoma, perioperative chemotherapy vs neoadjuvant chemoradiation for esophageal cancer, and osimertinib after definitive chemoradiotherapy for unresectable non–small cell lung cancer.
ASCO is piloting a slightly different format for research presentations this year. Instead of starting with context and background, speakers have been asked to present study results upfront as well as repeat them at the end of the talk. The reason behind the tweak is that engagement and retention tend to be better when results are presented upfront, instead of just at the end of a talk.
A popular session — ASCO Voices — has also been given a more central position in the conference: Friday, May 31. In this session, speakers will give short presentations about their personal experiences as providers, researchers, or patients.
ASCO Voices is a relatively recent addition to the meeting that has grown and gotten better. The talks are usually “very powerful narratives” that remind clinicians about “the importance of what they’re doing each day,” Dr. LeBlanc said.
Snippets of the talks will be played while people wait for sessions to begin at the meeting, so attendees who miss the Friday talks can still hear them.
In terms of educational sessions, Dr. LeBlanc highlighted two that might be of general interest to practicing oncologists: A joint ASCO/American Association for Cancer Research session entitled “Drugging the ‘Undruggable’ Target: Successes, Challenges, and the Road Ahead,” on Sunday morning and “Common Sense Oncology: Equity, Value, and Outcomes That Matter” on Monday morning.
As a blood cancer specialist, he said he is particularly interested in the topline results from the ASC4FIRST trial of asciminib, a newer kinase inhibitor, in newly diagnosed chronic myeloid leukemia, presented on Friday.
As in past years, this news organization will be on hand providing coverage with a dedicated team of reporters, editors, and videographers. Stop by our exhibit hall booth — number 26030 — to learn about the tools we offer to support your practice.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com .
From its origins in 1964, ASCO’s annual event has grown to become the world’s largest clinical oncology meeting, drawing attendees from across the globe.
More than 7000 abstracts were submitted for this year’s meeting a new record — and over 5000 were selected for presentation.
This year’s chair of the Annual Meeting Education Committee, Thomas William LeBlanc, MD, told us he has been attending the meeting since his training days more than a decade ago.
The event is “just incredibly empowering and energizing,” Dr. LeBlanc said, with opportunities to catch up with old colleagues and meet new ones, learn how far oncology has come and where it’s headed, and hear clinical pearls to take back the clinic.
This year’s theme, selected by ASCO President Lynn M. Schuchter, MD, is “The Art and Science of Cancer Care: From Comfort to Cure.”
Dr. LeBlanc, a blood cancer specialist at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, said the theme has been woven throughout the abstract and educational sessions. Most sessions will have at least one presentation related to how we support people — not only “when we cure them but also when we can’t cure them,” he said.
Topics will include patient well-being, comfort measures, and survivorship. And for the first time the plenary session will include a palliative care abstract that addresses whether or not palliative care can be delivered effectively through telemedicine. The session is on Sunday, June 2.
Other potentially practice changing plenary abstracts tackle immunotherapy combinations for resectable melanoma, perioperative chemotherapy vs neoadjuvant chemoradiation for esophageal cancer, and osimertinib after definitive chemoradiotherapy for unresectable non–small cell lung cancer.
ASCO is piloting a slightly different format for research presentations this year. Instead of starting with context and background, speakers have been asked to present study results upfront as well as repeat them at the end of the talk. The reason behind the tweak is that engagement and retention tend to be better when results are presented upfront, instead of just at the end of a talk.
A popular session — ASCO Voices — has also been given a more central position in the conference: Friday, May 31. In this session, speakers will give short presentations about their personal experiences as providers, researchers, or patients.
ASCO Voices is a relatively recent addition to the meeting that has grown and gotten better. The talks are usually “very powerful narratives” that remind clinicians about “the importance of what they’re doing each day,” Dr. LeBlanc said.
Snippets of the talks will be played while people wait for sessions to begin at the meeting, so attendees who miss the Friday talks can still hear them.
In terms of educational sessions, Dr. LeBlanc highlighted two that might be of general interest to practicing oncologists: A joint ASCO/American Association for Cancer Research session entitled “Drugging the ‘Undruggable’ Target: Successes, Challenges, and the Road Ahead,” on Sunday morning and “Common Sense Oncology: Equity, Value, and Outcomes That Matter” on Monday morning.
As a blood cancer specialist, he said he is particularly interested in the topline results from the ASC4FIRST trial of asciminib, a newer kinase inhibitor, in newly diagnosed chronic myeloid leukemia, presented on Friday.
As in past years, this news organization will be on hand providing coverage with a dedicated team of reporters, editors, and videographers. Stop by our exhibit hall booth — number 26030 — to learn about the tools we offer to support your practice.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com .
From its origins in 1964, ASCO’s annual event has grown to become the world’s largest clinical oncology meeting, drawing attendees from across the globe.
More than 7000 abstracts were submitted for this year’s meeting a new record — and over 5000 were selected for presentation.
This year’s chair of the Annual Meeting Education Committee, Thomas William LeBlanc, MD, told us he has been attending the meeting since his training days more than a decade ago.
The event is “just incredibly empowering and energizing,” Dr. LeBlanc said, with opportunities to catch up with old colleagues and meet new ones, learn how far oncology has come and where it’s headed, and hear clinical pearls to take back the clinic.
This year’s theme, selected by ASCO President Lynn M. Schuchter, MD, is “The Art and Science of Cancer Care: From Comfort to Cure.”
Dr. LeBlanc, a blood cancer specialist at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, said the theme has been woven throughout the abstract and educational sessions. Most sessions will have at least one presentation related to how we support people — not only “when we cure them but also when we can’t cure them,” he said.
Topics will include patient well-being, comfort measures, and survivorship. And for the first time the plenary session will include a palliative care abstract that addresses whether or not palliative care can be delivered effectively through telemedicine. The session is on Sunday, June 2.
Other potentially practice changing plenary abstracts tackle immunotherapy combinations for resectable melanoma, perioperative chemotherapy vs neoadjuvant chemoradiation for esophageal cancer, and osimertinib after definitive chemoradiotherapy for unresectable non–small cell lung cancer.
ASCO is piloting a slightly different format for research presentations this year. Instead of starting with context and background, speakers have been asked to present study results upfront as well as repeat them at the end of the talk. The reason behind the tweak is that engagement and retention tend to be better when results are presented upfront, instead of just at the end of a talk.
A popular session — ASCO Voices — has also been given a more central position in the conference: Friday, May 31. In this session, speakers will give short presentations about their personal experiences as providers, researchers, or patients.
ASCO Voices is a relatively recent addition to the meeting that has grown and gotten better. The talks are usually “very powerful narratives” that remind clinicians about “the importance of what they’re doing each day,” Dr. LeBlanc said.
Snippets of the talks will be played while people wait for sessions to begin at the meeting, so attendees who miss the Friday talks can still hear them.
In terms of educational sessions, Dr. LeBlanc highlighted two that might be of general interest to practicing oncologists: A joint ASCO/American Association for Cancer Research session entitled “Drugging the ‘Undruggable’ Target: Successes, Challenges, and the Road Ahead,” on Sunday morning and “Common Sense Oncology: Equity, Value, and Outcomes That Matter” on Monday morning.
As a blood cancer specialist, he said he is particularly interested in the topline results from the ASC4FIRST trial of asciminib, a newer kinase inhibitor, in newly diagnosed chronic myeloid leukemia, presented on Friday.
As in past years, this news organization will be on hand providing coverage with a dedicated team of reporters, editors, and videographers. Stop by our exhibit hall booth — number 26030 — to learn about the tools we offer to support your practice.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com .
ASTRO Releases New EBRT Guideline for Symptomatic Bone Mets
The guideline was needed to update previous recommendations and incorporate new high-quality evidence for the management of symptomatic bone metastases, Sara Alcorn, MD, PhD, of the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, and colleagues wrote in Practical Radiation Oncology.
The focus was on the efficacy of EBRT in reducing pain, improving skeletal function, and enhancing quality of life, they wrote in the clinical practice guideline.
In developing their recommendations, the ASTRO task force reviewed evidence from 53 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and 31 nonrandomized studies, and considered clinical experience.
Indications for Palliative Radiation
EBRT is strongly recommended for reducing pain from osseous metastasis and improving ambulatory status, sphincter function, and reducing pain in patients with spinal metastases causing compression of the spinal cord or cauda equina.
For patients with symptomatic bone metastases and an anticipated life expectancy of at least 4 weeks, EBRT is conditionally recommended to improve quality of life.
Implementation of other Treatments Alongside Palliative Radiation
Instead of RT alone, surgery with postoperative RT is conditionally recommended for patients with compression of the spinal cord or cauda equina.
Postoperative RT is strongly recommended for patients who have undergone surgery for non-spine bone metastases or spine metastases without involving spinal cord or cauda equina compression.
For patients with spinal bone metastases compressing the spinal cord or cauda equina, combining RT with dexamethasone is strongly recommended over RT alone.
Techniques, Dose-Fractionation, and Dose-Constraints for Initial Palliative Radiation
For patients with symptomatic bone metastases undergoing conventional palliative RT, strongly recommended doses are 800 cGy in 1 fraction, 2000 cGy in 5 fractions, 2400 cGy in 6 fractions, or 3000 cGy in 10 fractions.
For patients with spinal bone metastases causing compression of the spinal cord or cauda equina who are not candidates for initial surgical decompression and are treated with conventional palliative RT, strongly recommended doses are 800 cGy in 1 fraction, 1600 cGy in 2 fractions, 2000 cGy in 5 fractions, or 3000 cGy in 10 fractions.
When selecting dose-fractionation, consider patient and disease factors such as prognosis and radiosensitivity, the authors wrote.
Highly conformal planning and delivery techniques, such as intensity-modulated radiation therapy, are conditionally recommended for patients with spinal bone metastases compressing the spinal cord or cauda equina who are receiving dose-escalated palliative RT.
The strongly recommended stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) doses for patients with symptomatic bone metastases are 1200 to 1600 cGy in 1 fraction for non-spine metastases and 2400 cGy in 2 fractions for spine metastases. Other established SBRT dose and fractionation regimens with similar biologically effective doses may be considered based on patient tumor characteristics, normal tissue factors, and physician experience.
For patients with symptomatic bone metastases who have an ECOG PS of 0-2, are not undergoing surgical intervention, and have no neurological symptoms, SBRT is conditionally recommended over conventional palliative RT. Other factors to consider include life expectancy, tumor radiosensitivity, and metastatic disease burden, the guideline says.
Techniques, Dose-Fractionation, and Dose-Constraints for Palliative Reirradiation
For patients with spinal bone metastases requiring reirradiation to the same site, the strongly recommended conventional palliative RT regimens are 800 cGy in 1 fraction, 2000 cGy in 5 fractions, 2400 cGy in 6 fractions, or 2000 cGy in 8 fractions. When determining the RT dose-fractionation, consider the prior RT dose, time interval, and total spinal cord tolerance, the guideline says.
Treatment with SBRT is conditionally recommended for patients with spinal bone metastases needing reirradiation at the same site. When determining if SBRT is appropriate, consider patient factors such as urgency of treatment, prognosis, and radio-resistance. In addition, consider the prior RT dose, time interval, and total spinal cord tolerance when determining the RT dose-fractionation, the authors say.
The strongly recommended options for patients with symptomatic non-spine bone metastases needing reirradiation at the same site are single-fraction RT (800 cGy in 1 fraction) or multifraction conventional palliative RT (2000 cGy in 5 fractions or 2400 cGy in 6 fractions).
Impact of Techniques and Dose-fractionation on Quality of Life and Toxicity
For patients with bone metastases undergoing palliative radiation, it is strongly recommended to use a shared decision-making approach to determine the dose, fractionation, and supportive measures to optimize quality of life.
“Based on published data, the ASTRO task force’s recommendations inform best clinical practices on palliative RT for symptomatic bone metastases,” the guideline panelists said.
Limitations
While the guideline provides comprehensive recommendations, the panelists underscored the importance of individualized treatment approaches. Future research is needed to address gaps in evidence, particularly regarding advanced RT techniques and reirradiation strategies.
Guideline development was funded by ASTRO, with the systematic evidence review funded by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute. The panelists disclosed relationships with AstraZeneca, Elekta, Teladoc, and others.
The guideline was needed to update previous recommendations and incorporate new high-quality evidence for the management of symptomatic bone metastases, Sara Alcorn, MD, PhD, of the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, and colleagues wrote in Practical Radiation Oncology.
The focus was on the efficacy of EBRT in reducing pain, improving skeletal function, and enhancing quality of life, they wrote in the clinical practice guideline.
In developing their recommendations, the ASTRO task force reviewed evidence from 53 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and 31 nonrandomized studies, and considered clinical experience.
Indications for Palliative Radiation
EBRT is strongly recommended for reducing pain from osseous metastasis and improving ambulatory status, sphincter function, and reducing pain in patients with spinal metastases causing compression of the spinal cord or cauda equina.
For patients with symptomatic bone metastases and an anticipated life expectancy of at least 4 weeks, EBRT is conditionally recommended to improve quality of life.
Implementation of other Treatments Alongside Palliative Radiation
Instead of RT alone, surgery with postoperative RT is conditionally recommended for patients with compression of the spinal cord or cauda equina.
Postoperative RT is strongly recommended for patients who have undergone surgery for non-spine bone metastases or spine metastases without involving spinal cord or cauda equina compression.
For patients with spinal bone metastases compressing the spinal cord or cauda equina, combining RT with dexamethasone is strongly recommended over RT alone.
Techniques, Dose-Fractionation, and Dose-Constraints for Initial Palliative Radiation
For patients with symptomatic bone metastases undergoing conventional palliative RT, strongly recommended doses are 800 cGy in 1 fraction, 2000 cGy in 5 fractions, 2400 cGy in 6 fractions, or 3000 cGy in 10 fractions.
For patients with spinal bone metastases causing compression of the spinal cord or cauda equina who are not candidates for initial surgical decompression and are treated with conventional palliative RT, strongly recommended doses are 800 cGy in 1 fraction, 1600 cGy in 2 fractions, 2000 cGy in 5 fractions, or 3000 cGy in 10 fractions.
When selecting dose-fractionation, consider patient and disease factors such as prognosis and radiosensitivity, the authors wrote.
Highly conformal planning and delivery techniques, such as intensity-modulated radiation therapy, are conditionally recommended for patients with spinal bone metastases compressing the spinal cord or cauda equina who are receiving dose-escalated palliative RT.
The strongly recommended stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) doses for patients with symptomatic bone metastases are 1200 to 1600 cGy in 1 fraction for non-spine metastases and 2400 cGy in 2 fractions for spine metastases. Other established SBRT dose and fractionation regimens with similar biologically effective doses may be considered based on patient tumor characteristics, normal tissue factors, and physician experience.
For patients with symptomatic bone metastases who have an ECOG PS of 0-2, are not undergoing surgical intervention, and have no neurological symptoms, SBRT is conditionally recommended over conventional palliative RT. Other factors to consider include life expectancy, tumor radiosensitivity, and metastatic disease burden, the guideline says.
Techniques, Dose-Fractionation, and Dose-Constraints for Palliative Reirradiation
For patients with spinal bone metastases requiring reirradiation to the same site, the strongly recommended conventional palliative RT regimens are 800 cGy in 1 fraction, 2000 cGy in 5 fractions, 2400 cGy in 6 fractions, or 2000 cGy in 8 fractions. When determining the RT dose-fractionation, consider the prior RT dose, time interval, and total spinal cord tolerance, the guideline says.
Treatment with SBRT is conditionally recommended for patients with spinal bone metastases needing reirradiation at the same site. When determining if SBRT is appropriate, consider patient factors such as urgency of treatment, prognosis, and radio-resistance. In addition, consider the prior RT dose, time interval, and total spinal cord tolerance when determining the RT dose-fractionation, the authors say.
The strongly recommended options for patients with symptomatic non-spine bone metastases needing reirradiation at the same site are single-fraction RT (800 cGy in 1 fraction) or multifraction conventional palliative RT (2000 cGy in 5 fractions or 2400 cGy in 6 fractions).
Impact of Techniques and Dose-fractionation on Quality of Life and Toxicity
For patients with bone metastases undergoing palliative radiation, it is strongly recommended to use a shared decision-making approach to determine the dose, fractionation, and supportive measures to optimize quality of life.
“Based on published data, the ASTRO task force’s recommendations inform best clinical practices on palliative RT for symptomatic bone metastases,” the guideline panelists said.
Limitations
While the guideline provides comprehensive recommendations, the panelists underscored the importance of individualized treatment approaches. Future research is needed to address gaps in evidence, particularly regarding advanced RT techniques and reirradiation strategies.
Guideline development was funded by ASTRO, with the systematic evidence review funded by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute. The panelists disclosed relationships with AstraZeneca, Elekta, Teladoc, and others.
The guideline was needed to update previous recommendations and incorporate new high-quality evidence for the management of symptomatic bone metastases, Sara Alcorn, MD, PhD, of the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, and colleagues wrote in Practical Radiation Oncology.
The focus was on the efficacy of EBRT in reducing pain, improving skeletal function, and enhancing quality of life, they wrote in the clinical practice guideline.
In developing their recommendations, the ASTRO task force reviewed evidence from 53 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and 31 nonrandomized studies, and considered clinical experience.
Indications for Palliative Radiation
EBRT is strongly recommended for reducing pain from osseous metastasis and improving ambulatory status, sphincter function, and reducing pain in patients with spinal metastases causing compression of the spinal cord or cauda equina.
For patients with symptomatic bone metastases and an anticipated life expectancy of at least 4 weeks, EBRT is conditionally recommended to improve quality of life.
Implementation of other Treatments Alongside Palliative Radiation
Instead of RT alone, surgery with postoperative RT is conditionally recommended for patients with compression of the spinal cord or cauda equina.
Postoperative RT is strongly recommended for patients who have undergone surgery for non-spine bone metastases or spine metastases without involving spinal cord or cauda equina compression.
For patients with spinal bone metastases compressing the spinal cord or cauda equina, combining RT with dexamethasone is strongly recommended over RT alone.
Techniques, Dose-Fractionation, and Dose-Constraints for Initial Palliative Radiation
For patients with symptomatic bone metastases undergoing conventional palliative RT, strongly recommended doses are 800 cGy in 1 fraction, 2000 cGy in 5 fractions, 2400 cGy in 6 fractions, or 3000 cGy in 10 fractions.
For patients with spinal bone metastases causing compression of the spinal cord or cauda equina who are not candidates for initial surgical decompression and are treated with conventional palliative RT, strongly recommended doses are 800 cGy in 1 fraction, 1600 cGy in 2 fractions, 2000 cGy in 5 fractions, or 3000 cGy in 10 fractions.
When selecting dose-fractionation, consider patient and disease factors such as prognosis and radiosensitivity, the authors wrote.
Highly conformal planning and delivery techniques, such as intensity-modulated radiation therapy, are conditionally recommended for patients with spinal bone metastases compressing the spinal cord or cauda equina who are receiving dose-escalated palliative RT.
The strongly recommended stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) doses for patients with symptomatic bone metastases are 1200 to 1600 cGy in 1 fraction for non-spine metastases and 2400 cGy in 2 fractions for spine metastases. Other established SBRT dose and fractionation regimens with similar biologically effective doses may be considered based on patient tumor characteristics, normal tissue factors, and physician experience.
For patients with symptomatic bone metastases who have an ECOG PS of 0-2, are not undergoing surgical intervention, and have no neurological symptoms, SBRT is conditionally recommended over conventional palliative RT. Other factors to consider include life expectancy, tumor radiosensitivity, and metastatic disease burden, the guideline says.
Techniques, Dose-Fractionation, and Dose-Constraints for Palliative Reirradiation
For patients with spinal bone metastases requiring reirradiation to the same site, the strongly recommended conventional palliative RT regimens are 800 cGy in 1 fraction, 2000 cGy in 5 fractions, 2400 cGy in 6 fractions, or 2000 cGy in 8 fractions. When determining the RT dose-fractionation, consider the prior RT dose, time interval, and total spinal cord tolerance, the guideline says.
Treatment with SBRT is conditionally recommended for patients with spinal bone metastases needing reirradiation at the same site. When determining if SBRT is appropriate, consider patient factors such as urgency of treatment, prognosis, and radio-resistance. In addition, consider the prior RT dose, time interval, and total spinal cord tolerance when determining the RT dose-fractionation, the authors say.
The strongly recommended options for patients with symptomatic non-spine bone metastases needing reirradiation at the same site are single-fraction RT (800 cGy in 1 fraction) or multifraction conventional palliative RT (2000 cGy in 5 fractions or 2400 cGy in 6 fractions).
Impact of Techniques and Dose-fractionation on Quality of Life and Toxicity
For patients with bone metastases undergoing palliative radiation, it is strongly recommended to use a shared decision-making approach to determine the dose, fractionation, and supportive measures to optimize quality of life.
“Based on published data, the ASTRO task force’s recommendations inform best clinical practices on palliative RT for symptomatic bone metastases,” the guideline panelists said.
Limitations
While the guideline provides comprehensive recommendations, the panelists underscored the importance of individualized treatment approaches. Future research is needed to address gaps in evidence, particularly regarding advanced RT techniques and reirradiation strategies.
Guideline development was funded by ASTRO, with the systematic evidence review funded by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute. The panelists disclosed relationships with AstraZeneca, Elekta, Teladoc, and others.
FROM PRACTICAL RADIATION ONCOLOGY