Dr Joseph Alvarnas Addresses Rising Medical Costs

Healthcare practitioners are well aware that the rising cost of medical advances may affect their ability to deliver great care to all their patients, but there are ways they can address the issue, said Joseph Alvarnas, MD, the editor-in-chief of Evidence-Based Oncology.

Transcript (slightly modified for readability)

How can patients and clinicians balance new innovations in cancer care with the skyrocketing costs of those innovations?

That's a real interesting challenge. And it's very hard: this idea that as medicine moves forward it becomes profoundly more expensive is something that practitioners realize may at some point upend our ability to deliver great care to all of our patients. So what we try to do is be mindful of how we use medications, to ensure we use the right medication for the right patient based upon their risk, and based upon their specific clinical needs.

And I think to the extent that we can be stewards of best practice that it will lead us toward a greater potential for the sustainability of the healthcare system, including having those new pharmaceuticals available. Over time I think globally, the US, will have to address the issue of high-dollar pharmaceuticals, and whether there may be avenues toward addressing those that are most egregiously overpriced.