Oncology

A study published this week suggests that some anticancer treatments speed up the biological aging process, and this aging effect could be linked to the cognitive decline experienced by patients undergoing cancer treatment.

Every week, The American Journal of Managed Care® recaps the top managed care news of the week, and you can now listen to it on our podcast, Managed Care Cast.

This week, the top managed care news included HHS Secretary Alex Azar hinting that the government may get more involved in addressing social needs impacting health; work rules in Arkansas cost thousands their Medicaid coverage; research finds a shorter course of hepatitis C treatment may be just as effective as the full course of treatment.

As patients start chemotherapy to treat their cancer, they are educated on the side effects, particularly neutropenia, said Beth Wittmer, RN, OCN, manager of care management at Florida Cancer Specialists and Research Institute.

Thorvardur Halfdanarson, MD, associate professor of medicine and consultant in medical oncology, Mayo Clinic, outlines the biggest management challenges in neuroendocrine tumors (NETs).

In the keynote address at Patient-Centered Oncology Care® 2018, Barbara McAneny, MD, a New Mexico oncologist/hematologist and the current president of the American Medical Association (AMA), shared her diagnosis for the current crisis in US healthcare, as well as a prescription—a new real-time oncology payment model led by physicians.

Since chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy is still in early development there are benefits and risks that eligible patients will have to weigh, including the durable response against the limited amount of data and toxic side effects, said Brian Koffman, MDCM, DCFP, DABFM, MS Ed, medical director, CLL Society.

The FDA announced Friday it expanded the approved use of brentuximab vedotin (Adcetris) in combination with chemotherapy for adult patients with certain types of peripheral T-cell lymphoma, using a new review process designed to increase efficiency.

The addition of nivolumab to azacitidine led to significantly better overall response rate and overall survival compared with previous hypomethylating agent-based regimens in patients with relapsed acute myeloid leukemia (AML), according to the results of a recent phase 2 study.

At a session of The American Journal of Managed Care®'s Patient-Centered Oncology Care® 2018 meeting, held November 16 in Philadelphia, panelists shared their views on the future of oncology value-based payment models and how they as payers and providers can help advance these models.

As practices shift to value-based care, they need truly coordinated care teams that discuss high-risk patients and identify ways to deliver care to them, said Marcus Neubauer, MD, chief medical officer, US Oncology.

CMS' announcement of a new mandatory oncology bundled payment model wasn't a surprise. It reinforces CMS' continued commitment to creating innovative ways of transforming care.

Former chief exeutive officer of the West Cancer Center brings over 3 decades of technology, operations, and care advancement to the OneOncology National Network.

As a result of increased prevention and improved medical treatment of cardiovascular disease (CVD), and despite increasing rates of obesity and diabetes, cancer has gradually surpassed CVD as the leading cause of death in high-income counties. However, CVD is more likely to be the leading cause of death in low-income counties.

Patients with blood cancers are burdened with higher costs than patients with other cancers, and spending in blood cancers does not return to precancer levels, according to a new study from the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

It has been good knowing that treatments he has had a hand in developing will give years of quality life to patients, where treatments only gave a few months before, explained James Allison, PhD, chair of the Department of Immunology, the Vivian L. Smith Distinguished Chair in Immunology, director of the Parker Institute for Cancer Research, executive director of the Immunotherapy Platform at MD Anderson Cancer Center, and 2018 Nobel Prize cowinner in Medicine.

A cancer pain control program for inpatients based on electronic health record–based automatic screening provided effective pain relief and achieved high satisfaction among patients and physicians.

The announcement is an about-face from earlier efforts that scrapped a cardiac care bundled payment program originally developed during the Obama administration.

Thorvardur Halfdanarson, MD, associate professor of medicine and consultant in medical oncology, Mayo Clinic, discusses improvements in diagnostics for neuroendocrine tumors, as well as what improvements are still needed.

The use of CTLA-4, PD-1, or a combination approach achieved high response rates and improved overall survival in patients with CDKN2A mutations with metastatic melanoma, based on the results of a study by Helgadottir et al.

Daratumumab, a human CD38-directed monoclonal antibody, has been confirmed as safe in a population of heavily pretreated patients with multiple myeloma who received access to the treatment before the medication was commercially available, according to an early access treatment protocol study published in Cancer.

Hispanics living with HIV are at an increased risk of developing cancers caused by the human papillomavirus (HPV) compared to the general Hispanic population, and among people living with HIV, Hispanics are more likely to be diagnosed with cervical and penile cancer.

Somatostatins have been the most game-changing drug in the treatment landscape of gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine tumors, explained Scott Paulson, MD, co-director of the Gastrointestinal Research Program for The US Oncology Network, medical director for the Neuroendocrine Research and Treatment Center at Baylor Charles A. Sammons Cancer Center, Baylor University Medical Center.

While survival from leukemia improved among adults from 1995 to 2009, and the survival gap between sexes decreased, the racial gap did not, according to new research published in Cancer.

New guidelines released by the American Academy of Dermatology will help physicians provide the best treatment for more than 1 million Americans living with melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. The guidelines also highlight the importance of discussions between physicians and patients.

To speak about the success and continued development of Priority Health's payment reform model in cancer care, John Fox, MD, medical director at Priority Health, joined Dennis Zoet, chief business development officer at Cancer and Hematology Centers of Western Michigan, on a panel at the Community Oncology Alliance Payer Exchange Summit.

Heloisa Soares, MD, assistant professor, University of New Mexico Cancer Center-Albuquerque, outlines current barriers to achieving positive outcomes in neuroendocrine tumors (NETs) and what's in store for the future.

I’ve seen one case recently where a patient received $172,000 of drugs that were totally wasted. So, we’re going to be looking at this, we’re going to be looking at these middlemen getting in the way of the patient and the physician making a decision about their therapy, explained Ted Okon, executive director of COA.

Looking at total cost of care is difficult and figuring out what the practice is responsible for and not responsible for can be very difficult to do, said Lalan Wilfong, MD, executive vice president of Quality Programs at Texas Oncology.

A patient has their own set of values, providers have their own set of values, and the people that pay for it have their own set of values. So, [we all need to] come together, explains Bo Gamble, Director Of Strategic Practice Initiatives at the Community Oncology Alliance.