Improving Clinical Trial Enrollment Through Biomarker Testing: Anosheh Afghahi, MD

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Biomarker testing and clinical trial matching are becoming increasingly interconnected as biomarker testing both determines clinical trial eligibility and may pose a barrier to clinical trial enrollment.

“New health technology platforms may help to streamline centralized trial matching by directly integrating molecular data from commercial genomic testing laboratories,” Anosheh Afghahi, MD, medical oncologist at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus and senior medical director at Paradigm Health, said in an interview with The American Journal of Managed Care^®.

“This can help the local clinical research coordinators, as that list of patients that's reviewed is much smaller, and it can also help patients to get into a trial,” she said. “Without this type of service, there may be too many patients being seen by the oncologist, resourcing would not be as extensive, and they would potentially lose an opportunity to be on a trial.”

Afghahi, a panelist at the Denver Regional Institute for Value-Based Medicine®, spoke on a session highlighting the need for telehealth infrastructure integration and academic and community collaboration to improve geographic access to clinical trials in the Mountain West.

Afghahi also emphasized the importance of clinical trial sponsors creating design protocols that would improve clinical trial enrollment. Community oncology partnerships also play a crucial role as oncology leaders help provide suggestions on how to optimize clinical trials and protocols to further improve patient enrollment, she said.

“One thing that is a recurring theme is that allowing a standard of care cycle before the biomarker result has come back is really helpful in the community because the NGS [next-generation sequencing] testing results can take time,” Afghahi said.

To further strengthen community and academic partnerships, clinicians and leaders in both spaces trust one another to deliver the best care for patients. Afghahi reiterated her point from the panel discussion, emphasizing how patients don’t belong to a particular provider or health institution.

“They should be empowered to go and seek care where it's most beneficial for them at the right time for them,” she said.