Oncology

The American Journal of Managed Care® (AJMC®) recently spoke with Dinesh Kapur, MD, of Eastern Connecticut Hematology and Oncology, also known as ECHO, an advanced community oncology conference. Kapur spoke about how the value of community oncology, clinicial trials, and how staff are spending remote work days developing artificial intelligence (AI) tools for predictive patient analytics to improve care.

Douglas M. Long, MBA, vice president of industry relations for IQVIA, surveyed the effects of COVID-19 as he kicked off AMCP eLearning Days, a webinar series held in place of the annual meeting of the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy (AMCP).

In this preview interview for this year’s virtual 2020 Community Oncology Conference, The American Journal of Managed Care® speaks with Kathy Oubre, MS, chief operating officer of Pontchartrain Cancer Center in Louisiana, on why it is her privilege to work with patients who have cancer, as well as her thoughts on telehealth after the pandemic and why being in a hurricane-prone area necessitates healthcare that is flexible.

Individuals should register for Community Oncology Alliance's virtual meeting to hear "amazing" speakers present groundbreaking research, said Lalan Wilfong, MD, medical oncologist and vice president of value-based care and quality programs at Texas Oncology.

Networking with other practices, sharing ideas, and getting physicians involved in the process can aid community practices moving to alternative payment models (APMs), said Michael Diaz, MD, president of Community Oncology Alliance.

Policy, clinical, and targeted therapy updates in oncology.

The Association of Community Cancer Centers held its 46th Annual Meeting and Cancer Center Business Summit March 4 to 6 in Washington, DC.

“Quest for Value: Advancing Oncology Value-based Care,” this year’s first installment in the Institute for Value-Based Medicine (IVBM) from The American Journal of Managed Care®, zeroed in seniors, a population that’s growing not just in Florida but across the United States. Older Americans are more likely to develop cancer, but thanks to better detection and treatment, they are more likely to survive cancer, too.

Payers view the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) guidelines as a gold standard for making reimbursement decisions, according to a panel of experts who spoke recently about biosimilar uptake.

Patients with cancer are reporting that they have faced treatment delays due to the novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19); the Trump administration reached an agreement with 3M Co. to produce nearly 167 million face masks in the next 3 months; US hospitals cite lack of supplies, testing coordination as major obstacles during the pandemic, according to an HHS survey.

“These are times of unprecedented and unimaginable challenges for our health care system."

"We want to make sure practices have time to learn, understand, adapt, and modify, to a new Oncology Care Model," said Michael Diaz, MD, president of Community Oncology Alliance.

Racial and ethnic biases held by research and clinical professionals could contribute to low minority participation in oncology clinical trials, according to a study recently published in Cancer, a journal from the American Cancer Society.

We think that the ACCC is uniquely positioned to bridge the gap between the needs in clinical trials and the patients who are in the community. Most clinical oncology is delivered in the community. That's where the patients are, that's where the need is, said Randall Oyer, MD, medical director of the Oncology Program at Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health and president of ACCC.

There has been significant improvement in payers' understanding of site of care issues, but steps still need to be taken to address these issues, said Lucio Gordan, MD, president and managing physician at Florida Cancer Specialists.

Ensuring that all frontline clinicians are equipped, confident, and engaged in executing skilled communication, which is at the core of palliative care, will make a significant difference for how value-based care unfolds, how payment reform happens, and how the lived experience plays out for patients and families to be a better one, said Rebecca Kirch, JD, executive vice president, Health Care, Quality and Value, National Patient Advocate Foundation.

I think a lot of it is, do you trust the people that you're going to be working with? What does it come down to economically? And then I would say on the third end is what can really be done to enhance patient care? As it relates to the decision that you make, said Bradley Prechtl, MBA, chief executive officer of the American Oncology Network.

This week’s selection was one of our most-read articles of 2018.

The authors said their study is the first to show that targeted treaments for patients with certain molecular alterations could be a possibility in pancreatic cancer.

My Presidential theme was to look at the interdisciplinary care team involved in the actual delivery of cancer therapies and cancer care, said Ali McBride, PharmD, MS, BCPS, BCOP, clinical coordinator of hematology/oncology in the Department of Pharmacy at The University of Arizona Cancer Center and outgoing president of ACCC.

There are many applications that are available today that could be brought into the oncology landscape to create a much more patient-centered focus of experiences for those undergoing care, said Susan Dentzer, senior policy fellow at the Duke-Margolis Center for Health Policy.

How can community oncology practices keep up with changing federal regulations and the constant fl ow of new scientific evidence, while delivering quality care in the era of payment reform? The answer, said panelists at Patient-Centered Oncology Care®, is to stay independent by working together.

https://www.pharmacytimes.org/on-demand/managed-care-considerations-for-navigating-biosimilar-and-her2-directed-therapies-for-the-treatment-of-her2-positive-breast-cancer

During a discussion at The American Journal of Managed Care®’s Patient- Centered Oncology Care® meeting in Philadelphia, panelists outlined the efficacy of the 2 FDA-approved therapies, Medicare reimbursement for CAR T-cell therapies, and the pace of innovation in healthcare.

With our current issue of Evidence-Based Oncology™ focusing on clinical pathways in cancer care, we look back at one of our most-read papers of 2016.

The decline can be attributed to long-term drops in death rates for the 4 major cancers—lung, colorectal, breast, and prostate.

Dr Alvarnas is editor-in-chief of Evidence-Based Oncology.™ He is vice president of Government Affairs, senior medical director for Employer Strategy, and associate clinical professor, Hematology & Hematologic Cell Transplantation, City of Hope, Duarte, Califonia.

As cancer care becomes more complex and more expensive, decision-support algorithms offer a mechanism to define best practice, reduce unwarranted variation, and control costs across growing networks.

This week, top managed care stories included survey results on oncology practices’ willingness to take on risk; a warning of flu among children in detention centers; study findings establishing a link between circadian rhythm and type 2 diabetes.

From a value-based medicine perspective, we think there's no greater value in the healthcare system than improving survival for cancer patients and reducing the costs of treating late stage cancer; we believe the GRAIL test could be the test case for how to make this transition, said Joshua Ofman, MD, MSHS, chief of Corporate Strategy and External Affairs at GRAIL Inc.