The retrospective analysis of 145 patients with stage 2-3 rectal cancer found that the "wait and watch" approach, instead of surgery, in patients treated with chemotherapy might work just as well when measuring survival as an outcome.
A retrospective review of clinical data on 145 patients with stage 2-3 rectal cancer indicates that patients whose tumors completely disappeared after treatment with chemoradiation and systemic chemotherapy (known as a complete response) had similar four-year survival rates regardless of whether they had immediate surgery or pursued a “watch and wait” surveillance approach. The findings add to growing evidence suggesting that, with frequent follow-up exams after initial chemotherapy and radiation, select patients with rectal cancer can achieve excellent outcomes while avoiding the risks and complications of rectal surgery. The study will be presented at the upcoming 2015 Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposiumin San Francisco.
“We believe that our results will encourage more doctors to consider this watch and wait approach in patients with clinical complete response as an alternative to immediate rectal surgery, at least for some patients,” said senior study author Philip Paty, MD, a surgical oncologist at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, NY. “From my experience, most patients are willing to accept some risk to defer rectal surgery in hope of avoiding major surgery and preserving rectal function.”
Link to the ASCO press release: http://bit.ly/1DVC03T
Examining Low-Value Cancer Care Trends Amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic
April 25th 2024On this episode of Managed Care Cast, we're talking with the authors of a study published in the April 2024 issue of The American Journal of Managed Care® about their findings on the rates of low-value cancer care services throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.
Listen
Oncology Onward: A Conversation With Penn Medicine's Dr Justin Bekelman
December 19th 2023Justin Bekelman, MD, director of the Penn Center for Cancer Care Innovation, sat with our hosts Emeline Aviki, MD, MBA, and Stephen Schleicher, MD, MBA, for our final episode of 2023 to discuss the importance of collaboration between academic medicine and community oncology and testing innovative cancer care delivery in these settings.
Listen