Interviews

Tiffany Meng, PharmD, oncology pharmacist, UCSF Health, discusses ways that pharmacists can help guide patients to financial assistance programs to help facilitate better access to breast cancer therapies.

Lidia Schapira, MD, FASCO, professor of medicine at Stanford Medicine, medical oncologist, and director for the Stanford Cancer Institute and the Stanford Comprehensive Cancer Center, discusses the impact of social determinants of health (SDOH) when it comes to accessing innovative breast cancer treatments.

Jade E. Jones, MD, of Emory Winship Cancer Institute, shares how considering patients' travel needs, social services, and insurance concerns can help improve access to care.

Susan Escudier, MD, FACP, discusses the impact of insurance coverage gaps, transportation barriers, and financial hardships on cancer care access and emphasizes the need for payers to better support patients at high risk.

In the wake of novel bispecific and chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapies for various cancers, geography still plays a big role in patients' abilities to receive such treatments.

In part 3 of this conversation, Karen Winkfield, MD, PhD, executive director of the Meharry-Vanderbilt Alliance, discusses why basic scientific research remains essential and how patient experiences contribute.

Clayton Irvine, PharmD, MBA, MS, senior manager of oncology care at Mayo Clinic, emphasizes the need for health care providers to balance quality patient care with rising costs by openly discussing financial implications with patients and educating themselves on cost-effective treatments.

February 4 is World Cancer Day, and in these interviews with our Strategic Alliance Partner, NYU Langone Health, we learn about the importance of forming strong relationships with the communities you are located in and with whom you work to optimize cancer-related outcomes.

Travis Brewer, vice president of payer and public health strategy/relations at Texas Oncology, shared that value-based oncology care can achieve both cost efficiency and high-quality outcomes through integrated multidisciplinary teams, flexible payment models, and targeted treatment approaches.

Chelsee Jensen, PharmD, BCPS, senior pharmacy specialist at Mayo Clinic, suggests that medical providers can reduce patient and system costs by optimizing the use of generics and biosimilars, which offer lower costs without compromising safety and efficacy.

Kirollos Hanna, PharmD, BCPS, BCOP, FACCC, director of pharmacy at Minnesota Oncology, discusses how the prospect of patient longevity, amidst advancing therapeutics, factors into oncology care.

Edgardo S. Santos, MD, FACP, FASCO, a hematologist and medical oncologist, discussed how artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing lung cancer care by analyzing imaging data to detect malignancies and interstitial lung disease, while stressing the importance of regulation to ensure its safe and ethical use.

Dawn Klemow, MD, assistant clinical professor, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, previews some of the most recent advances in breast cancer treatment.

In part 2 of our interview with Karen Winkfield, MD, PhD, she speaks to the importance of ensuring health care accessibility and of knowing that the health care system is not a one-size-fits-all arrangement.

Tiago Biachi, MD, PhD, highlighted the transformative role of personalized medicine in gastrointestinal (GI) cancer treatment through advances in next-generation sequencing and circulating tumor DNA, while emphasizing the importance of lifestyle factors in prevention and recurrence.

In the second half of our interview with Brita Roy, MD, MPH, MHS, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, she discusses effective engagement of minoritized populations in discussion of medical mistrust.

Edgardo S. Santos, MD, FACP, FASCO, emphasized the need to eliminate the stigma around smoking in lung cancer, highlighted the importance of early detection and discussed how advances in precision medicine, genomic studies, and targeted therapies have improved patient outcomes and reduced health care costs.

In this second half of our interview with Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s Travis Osterman, DO, MS, FAMIA, FASCO, he discusses opportunities for advancing the smart use of artificial intelligence (AI) in cancer care.

Cochair of our recent Institute for Value-Based Medicine® event hosted with NYU Langone Health, Oscar B. Lahoud, MD, speaks on his hoped-for top health care priorities under the incoming administration.

Edgardo S. Santos, MD, FACP, FASCO, discussed the barriers to precision medicine in lung cancer treatment, including patient concerns about technology understanding and insurance coverage, as well as the reliance on traditional tissue biopsies, emphasizing the benefits of combining liquid and tissue biopsies to improve treatment outcomes and clinical trial eligibility.

Tim Mok, PharmD, BCPS, BCOP, malignant hematology pharmacy research analyst at Kaiser Permanente, discussed his perspective on the balance between clinical outcomes and cost considerations.

In this second part of our interview with Kasey Bond, MPH, NYU Langone Health, we discuss the contributions of community health workers to increasing clinical trial access and how technology—artificial intelligence (AI), in particular—can help to facilitate the process.

Tiago Biachi, MD, PhD, discusses the challenges of treating gastrointestinal (GI) cancers, particularly the limited effectiveness of immunotherapy for "cold tumors" and the need to make them more responsive to immune treatments.

Song Park, MD, University of Washington Medicine, advocates for more user-friendly technology to support equitable skin cancer care access.

In our ongoing conversation with James Cancer Hospital’s Don M. Benson, MD, PhD, he explains his philosophy of always striving to deliver personalized patient care.

Sara Grethlien, MD, MBA, FACP, Swedish Cancer Institute, looks ahead to the future of oncology care and important value-based care considerations.

The individual behavior of a patient’s myeloproliferative neoplasm (MPN) will determine how the disease is monitored and managed in the long term, explained Jennifer Vaughn, MD, of The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Edgardo S. Santos, MD, FACP, FASCO, highlighted how liquid biopsies are transforming lung cancer care by enabling faster, less invasive diagnostics, with key applications in early detection, predictive biomarker identification, treatment response monitoring, resistance mechanism assessment, and minimal residual disease detection.