Oncology

Many people believe health equity is such a big issue that there is not much an individual practice can do to address it, explained Susan Sabo-Wagner, MSN, RN, OCN, executive director of clinical strategy, Oncology Consultants of Houston.

On this episode of Managed Care Cast, we feature several leaders in diversity, equity, and inclusion advancing health equity in their respective organization’s policy and practice initiatives.

Osimertinib (Tagrisso; AstraZeneca) now has shown a statistically significant and clinically meaningful overall survival benefit in both the early adjuvant and late-stage metastatic settings.

Samyukta Mullangi, MD, MBA, oncology fellow at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and incoming medical director at Thyme Care, explained Thyme Care’s value-based care (VBC) system in oncology and the benefits of care navigation.

Spending on novel therapies in high-risk bladder cancer had minimal impact on Oncology Care Model payments to practices, according to this cohort study and an average performance estimation.

Manmeet Ahluwalia, MD, MBA, chief, Solid Tumor Medical Oncology; deputy director; and chief scientific officer at Miami Cancer Institute, addressed disparities in genomic testing among minority patients with cancer, as well as equitable care strategies at his organization’s Center for Equity in Cancer Care & Research.

A session at the Association of Community Cancer Centers (ACCC) 2023 Annual Meeting and Cancer Center Business Summit highlighted ongoing issues in oncology policy and payment, from the Cures 2.0 Act to 340B drug reimbursement.

Jeff Hunnicutt, CEO of Highlands Oncology Group, explains the 2 risk options provided under the Enhancing Oncology Model (EOM) and why the mandatory downside risk might give pause to practices that saw some success in the Oncology Care Model.

As scientists are identifying molecular alterations in patients with later-stage cancers that may be targets in earlier-stage disease, next-generation sequencing is being utilized more in the first-line setting, noted Sigrun Hallmeyer, MD, medical oncologist with Advocate Health.

A session at the ACCC 2023 Annual Meeting and Cancer Center Business Summit addressed the promise and potential drawbacks of multicancer early detection (MCED) testing for patients in the primary care setting.

In the first keynote session at the ACCC 2023 Annual Meeting and Cancer Center Business Summit, the history of CRISPR genome editing and its potential in cancer and other settings took center stage.

Utilizing real-world evidence that applies to the specific care needs of certain patient populations can promote timely decision-making among payers and providers on the use of effective cancer therapies available on the market, said panelists at the 2022 Patient-Centered Oncology Care® (PCOC) meeting.

Coverage from the January 18, 2023, Institute for Value-Based Medicine session with Regional Cancer Care Associates held in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

Richard L. Martin III, MD, MPH, medical director for Health Equity and Community Engagement, Tennessee Oncology; president, Tennessee Oncology Practice Society.

A novel algorithm based on patient-reported outcome questionnaires stratified patients by disease complexity and effectively identified those at a higher risk of having an acute care visit.

The findings emphasize a need for policies that may offset the impact of direct and indirect costs for patients with breast cancer.

Five leading academic cancer centers are assessing the feasibility of implementing the Health Equity Report Card pilot project as a tool that can both meaningfully and feasibly measure and report on equitable care practices.

The approval is based on results from the phase 3 TROPiCS-02 trial demonstrating overall and progression survival benefits with sacituzumab govitecan compared with physician’s choice of single-agent chemotherapy.

A review and meta-analysis published in the journal Radiology found MRI to be the most effective supplemental breast cancer screening method for women with dense breasts and negative mammogram results.