Dr Harlan Levine Previews Focus of Featured Discussion at Patient-Centered Oncology Care® 2020

During a featured discussion at this year’s Patient-Centered Oncology Care® 2020 virtual meeting, innovations and the subsequent challenges in employing these advances within the treatment of cancer will be addressed, said Harlan Levine, MD, president of strategy and business ventures at City of Hope.

Transcript

AJMC®: What message do you hope to bring to those taking part in Patient-Centered Oncology Care 2020?

Levine: I’m looking forward to the conference. My talk will focus on the fact that in 2020, we are making tremendous progress in the treatment of cancer, with new therapeutics and precision medicine changing the paradigm for care, but the speed with which these changes are happening and the cost of care are creating challenges—challenges for the well-intended community physicians that are trying to keep up with all the changes, but also challenges to affordability.

During my talk, I hope to show that cancer is different, and the methods that are traditionally used to manage both the quality and cost of chronic diseases such as diabetes or back pain should not be misapplied to cancer. In cancer, your best chance of cure is your first chance of cure, and during my talk, I hope to introduce new ideas and new approaches to make sure that people with cancer get the right care, at the right place, at the right time.