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What Subset of CLL Patients Should Utilize Telemedicine?

What Subset of CLL Patients Should Utilize Telemedicine? from Patient Empowerment Network on Vimeo.

With monitoring of chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), there is a subset of patients that will get the most benefit from telemedicine visits. Learn more about which CLL patients should use telemedicine and which higher risk patients should still visit in-person. 

See More From the CLL TelemEDucation Empowerment Resource Center

Related Resources:

 

What CLL Population Will Benefit Most From Telemedicine?

How Will Telemedicine Impact Time-Limited Therapy in CLL?

Will Telemedicine Be Part of Routine Management for CLL?

 

Transcript:

Stephanie Chuang: 

Can you share the telemedicine platforms that you, in your practice, use and maybe so far, what are some of the best practices observed?

Dr. John Pagel: 

Right, and I think that’s probably the biggest key and takeaway that we can talk about here for the audience, is to remember that telemedicine isn’t going to be appropriate for every patient. And for each individual patient, there are times where it certainly would be very appropriate and other times where it might not be. So, you know, of course, people that have active, growing, rapidly progressing disease, we’re not talking about those people, those people need to be seen by their provider, they need, of course, close attention and monitoring. But many, many patients, in fact, the majority of patients with CLL are not in that kind of group.

So we’re talking about people that don’t have high-risk genetic features, in particular, those are things like a deletion of the short arm of chromosome 17, that’s a 17p deletion, or an 11q deletion or a TP53 aberration, those are genetic risks that your doctor will know about with regard to your specific individual CLL. And most people, fortunately don’t have those features and they behave in a very indolent, slow growing, more benign-like fashion, and then those are the people where probably telemedicine would be appropriate for many visits.

I’ll just say, I would suggest that in general, telemedicine shouldn’t be something that you do with every single visit. Every once in a while, you should have that face-to-face, hands-on interaction with your primary provider. But I’ll also remind people that not everyone lives real close to their oncologist or even their CLL expert. So if you’re far away, you can connect not just with your oncologist who takes care of you, but with an expert who might be some distance away, and that’s the beauty I hear about the telemedicine.

Will Telemedicine Be Part of Routine Management for CLL?

Will Telemedicine Be Part of Routine Management for CLL? from Patient Empowerment Network on Vimeo.

With the COVID-19 health crisis, telemedicine has emerged as part of routine healthcare. Watch as CLL expert Dr. John Pagel gives his viewpoint on how telemedicine will be included in routine management of CLL. 

See More From the CLL TelemEDucation Empowerment Resource Center

Related Resources:

 

What CLL Population Will Benefit Most From Telemedicine?

How Will Telemedicine Impact Time-Limited Therapy in CLL?

What Subset of CLL Patients Should Utilize Telemedicine?

 

Transcript:

Stephanie: 

You know, of course, COVID-19 has forced healthcare providers to use telemedicine more than ever before, so do you think this will definitely continue on past COVID-19? And if so, how quickly it will even grow?

Dr. John Pagel: 

Well, I think the federal government’s understanding that this is a part of medicine moving forward that’s important for patients, patients like it, and I don’t blame them. If I’m on that side of care, I feel perfectly fine, I have CLL, let’s say, and nothing’s going on with me, and I’m very well-educated about my disease, and by the way, that’s probably critically important to this whole conversation is to understand and be educated well about your specific disease.

Remember, each patient has to be their own best advocate. And that makes telemedicine work. And frankly, the horse is out of the barn, in my opinion, telemedicine is where we’re going, and it’s not going to come back. Patients like it, physicians are getting used to it, Stephanie, it’s something that we are reluctantly in some ways adopting, but it’s just how it is, and I think it’s going to be a major important thing for many, many CLL patients as routine management. 

How Will Telemedicine Impact Time-Limited Therapy in CLL?

How Will Telemedicine Impact Time-Limited Therapy in CLL? from Patient Empowerment Network on Vimeo.

With chronic lymphocytic leukemia time-limited therapy, treatment is delivered for a pre-determined period of time and then is stopped after remission is achieved. Learn how telemedicine impacts patients on this type of treatment. 

See More From the CLL TelemEDucation Empowerment Resource Center

Related Resources:

 

What CLL Population Will Benefit Most From Telemedicine?

Will Telemedicine Be Part of Routine Management for CLL?

What Subset of CLL Patients Should Utilize Telemedicine?

 

Transcript:

Stephanie: 

Dr. Pagel, we’d love to ask about the time-limited therapy in CLL specifically, and how telemedicine might play a role in that?

 

Dr. John Pagel: 

Well, this is one of the things that we’re still learning about, Stephanie, and I think it’s going to evolve and change a bit over time, but we know that we need to do. Continually better for patients, of course, we need to meet unmet needs in CLL. And there are lots of unmet needs still in CLL, of course, one of them is curing the disease, and we’re not focusing on therapeutics today in our discussion about working towards that goal, but that does remain a major goal, and we’re working towards that. But really, of course, there are situations with unmet needs where people have been getting therapy continuously now for long, indefinite periods of time, and they may not need all that therapy. And so one of the things is that we’re learning about is what you mentioned time-limited therapy. So the idea of delivering therapy for some defined period of time, getting to a very good remission and then stopping therapy. And where telemedicine comes into play there, is that if they’re off of therapy and doing well, we don’t need to necessarily drag those patients back to the clinic and put them through, not only all of that exposure and that risk, but of course the anxiety that goes with it and everything else.

So again, I think that in those cases where we’re monitoring patients with telemedicine, it’s beautiful for time-limited therapy, and it also allows for us to stay even in closer contact with our patients who again, might have some difficulty getting into the clinic. 

What CLL Population Will Benefit Most From Telemedicine?

What CLL Population Will Benefit Most From Telemedicine? from Patient Empowerment Network on Vimeo.

Among chronic lymphocytic leukemia patients (CLL), there are some that will benefit more from telemedicine visits that have become common practice during the coronavirus crisis. Watch as respected CLL expert Dr. John Pagel explains.

See More From the CLL TelemEDucation Empowerment Resource Center

Related Resources:

 

How Will Telemedicine Impact Time-Limited Therapy in CLL?

Will Telemedicine Be Part of Routine Management for CLL?

What Subset of CLL Patients Should Utilize Telemedicine?

 

Transcript:

Stephanie: 
Now the pandemic has, of course, presented both challenges and opportunities for clinicians who are trying to manage diverse health conditions, and of course, we’re not just talking about COVID-19. So on the positive side, Dr. Pagel, what are the opportunities you see for CLL patients using telemedicine?

Dr. John Pagel: 
Well, you’re right, Stephanie, it isn’t just about COVID, but COVID has certainly changed the landscape of how we approach many patients in 2020 and now in the future moving forward and particularly with regards to telemedicine. And that’s particularly relevant to CLL patients in particular. CLL, remember is a chronic disease, it’s of course, part of the name chronic lymphocytic leukemia, and people will live with this disease for many, many years, perhaps even decades, and often not even be getting therapy but still have, of course, the disease.

And they need to be monitored, and they are commonly monitored with what we call active surveillance. And active surveillance is typically, as the audience well knows, periodic evaluations with physical examinations and perhaps even some laboratory blood work that’s done on an associated visit. And because of the need for those things over the last many years of how we follow people, with active surveillance, people. We have seen frequently in the clinic, and perhaps in some ways they’ve been seen when they perhaps could be evaluated and taken care of in a different way, and that’s where telemedicine comes in for select appropriate CLL patients. Where maybe we don’t need to bring them in to see their provider, they can get labs done perhaps locally at their primary care physician’s office, if the labs need to be done. And often the physical exam can be even done by video or — so by showing the provider what might be going on, and lots of times that physical exam may not even be important.

What do I mean by that? We’ll remember, there are lots of times where even if you have a lymph node or two around, we’re not going to actually institute or change treatment. So there’s a very unique important population of people with CLL who could obviously benefit from telemedicine moving forward.