What are the latest advances in lung cancer treatment and research? Dr. Isabel Preeshagul shares information about new treatment approvals, an update on targeted therapies, and new clinical trial approaches.
Dr. Isabel Preeshagul is a thoracic medical oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Learn more about Dr. Preeshagul here.
Dr. Preeshagul, when it comes to lung cancer research and emerging treatment options, what specifically are you excited about?
Dr. Preeshagul:
So, honestly, I feel that my interest and excitement are getting pulled in a million different directions as of now. Over the past 16 months, we’ve had 10 approvals in lung cancer, which is unheard of.
Katherine Banwell:
Wow.
Dr. Preeshagul:
It’s been a very, very, very busy time for us as thoracic oncologists, which is really exciting.
I feel that we’ve really come to the forefront of cancer research, which is outstanding. In terms of what makes me excited, right now, I think it’s probably two things. There have been genetic alterations, somatic, that have really been almost like the orphan child in lung cancer. And we have unfortunately had to tell patients, “Listen, you have this KRAS G12C alteration. We know that it portents a poor prognosis. We know it’s more aggressive, but we don’t have anything for you that can target that.”
And as of recently, within the past two months, we had this approval for a drug called sotorasib (Lumakras). This is based on the AMG 510 study. And it is a targeted therapy for patients with KRAS G12C, and the responses have been excellent.
So, finally, we have something. So, it makes me feel good that when I have a patient that unfortunately has this alteration, I no longer have to give them the same song and dance, that I can talk about sotorasib and talk about it with confidence and talk to them about the data. And the same thing is true for patients with an EGFR exon 20 alteration with amivantamab that just got approved. So, it is now, I feel, that research is now unveiling these orphan alterations that we are now having targeted therapies for.
So, that makes me excited. Also, something else that’s making me excited is the fact that we’re realizing and learning to anticipate these resistance alterations. So, we know if you have an EGFR mutation for say, we know now that, unfortunately, at some point, the treatments that we’re goingto give you, this targeted therapy, this pill called osimertinib (Tagrisso) in the frontline setting, for some patients, unfortunately, at some point, it’s not going to work for you anymore.
And this is because the cancer gets smart. It develops these resistance alterations. It knows how to usurp the osimertinib, and resist it, and make an alternate pathway, or change its form, turn into small cell, or come up with another alteration that makes the osimertinib not work.
So, we’re realizing to look for these alterations earlier, faster than when a patient starts progressing, and anticipating them. So, our trials are now being designed in a way with combination therapy to figure out a way to outsmart this cancer. We always have to be one step ahead. And unfortunately, cancer is still many steps ahead of us. But we are learning to be smarter.
https://powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/Expert-Perspective-Exciting-Advances-in-Lung-Cancer-Treatment-and-Research-1.png600600Kara Rayburnhttps://www.powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/New-Logo-300x126.pngKara Rayburn2021-08-18 14:29:362021-08-18 14:55:17Expert Perspective: Exciting Advances in Lung Cancer Treatment and Research
What are some solutions to lung cancer care barriers? Experts Dr. Nicole Rochester and Dr. Olugbenga Okusanyashare key advice for working to overcome care barriers for optimal care.
You’ve gone through a lot of the barriers that patients and their family caregivers may face. Let’s talk about some of the solutions. Are there a few solutions that you can suggest for overcoming some of these barriers that you just described?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Yeah, I think from the patient perspective, there are a number of things you can do to really help yourself. Number one is a good healthy dose of research, that means getting online, Googling, finding lung cancer experts, preferably in your region, finding out what their interests are, what are the things that they typically research and take care of, and then finding a way to get in contact with them. I think that is really step number one, it’s finding someone who specializes in the disease, and then to find someone that you actually get along, someone who you have a relationship with, a truly therapeutic relationship and invest in that person, and if they’re the right person for you, whether it be personality fit, whether it be background, you will find a relationship with them that will actually help you get through that process. I would also say many programs actually have nurse navigators who are people that help you navigate this process, that is quite literally why they are part of the health system, so if you can find programs and have nurse navigators, they can really be instrumental in setting up appointments that are either overlapped right after one another, all in the same place, things that really help smooth the edges of getting all the work I’ve done at on time.
And again, I would also recommend the patients, I would try to stack your appointments or stack your visits so that they are not quite so spread out over space and time, because a visit, usually it takes a few days to get a result, which then takes a few days to get a course of action, which then can sometimes provoke another test.
So, the more times that things are stacked together and information just to get in big packets, I think really the better for moving through the process.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
I think what I’m hearing in your answers is really the importance of patients putting themselves in the driver’s seat, which is another thing that I strongly advocate for. I think many patients and family members don’t see that as their role, and they don’t understand and appreciate the value of doing these things that you just talked about, doing your own research and finding providers with whom you connect, it’s so incredibly important, especially when it comes to cancer and other serious diseases.
https://powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/What-Are-Solutions-to-Lung-Cancer-Care-Barriers.png600600Kara Rayburnhttps://www.powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/New-Logo-300x126.pngKara Rayburn2021-08-03 14:11:472021-08-03 14:48:47What Are Solutions to Lung Cancer Care Barriers?
How can those living with lung cancer ensure they get quality care even if they live in rural areas? How can lung cancer patients gain confidence in voicing treatment concerns and in communicating with their healthcare team? Watch as Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya shares key points about such vital topics for the lung cancer community.
Hello and welcome. I’m Dr. Nicole Rochester, your host for today’s Patient Empowerment Network program. Today we’re going to be talking about how long cancer patients can truly get the best care no matter where you and your family live. We’re going to talk about things like how can I remove roadblocks in my care to gain access to state-of-the-art treatment? Will my insurance limit me if I want to get a second opinion? As a care partner, how do I best advocate for my partner, and is a clinical trial right for me? The answers to some of these questions we’ve received revolve around awareness, feeling empowered to ask questions, and connecting to the right resources at the right time. In this program we’ll be learning just that as we meet our guest expert. It is my honor and privilege to be joined by Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya, he is an assistant professor of Thoracic Surgery at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. Thank you so much for joining us, Dr. Okusanya.
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Absolutely. It’s a pleasure to be here, thank you for having me.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
Now we’re gonna start with talking about some of the barriers to lung cancer care. We know that there are many factors that can negatively impact outcomes for patients and families facing a lung cancer diagnosis, including things like social stigma for smoking, geographic location, socioeconomic status, insurance and access to care, financial hardships, and access to transportation. So, my first question to you, Dr. Okusanya is, what are some of the barriers that both lung cancer patients and their care partners face when they are seeking care?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
First of all, thank you very much for putting a spotlight on lung cancer care, we really need more people to help us treat this really terrible disease.
There are a number of barriers for our patients in order to get the best care possible. Number one, we actually find at diagnosis, we find that a lot of patients have lung nodules that have been seen because maybe they got a chest x-ray or a CAT scan for some other reason, and maybe they don’t get followed up on because they don’t have a steady source of healthcare, they don’t have a PCP or someone who regularly follows up on their health information. We have trouble also sometimes getting patients in the appropriate diagnostic studies that they need, oftentimes, we find patients that may show up in the hospital that have a significant problem and they may need a special kind of CAT scan or a biopsy, and they simply do not have the resources to get to said CAT scan or get to said biopsy, which is critical in making the appropriate diagnosis so we can get them to the right therapy. One of the biggest things that you mentioned is finding a specialist in terms of all aspects of lung cancer care, whether it is surgery, medical oncology, or radiation oncology, there are medical practitioners that mostly specialize in lung cancer care, and because of that, they’re gonna have access to different resources, they’re gonna think differently about the disease process and they’re gonna approach each patient differently because of the disease process So finding someone who really thinks and works in the lung cancer space all the time, I think it’s a barrier to patients getting really good care.
We also find that one, cancer care has a lot of hurdles, apart from proper CAT scans, biopsies, work-ups, actual interventions, there are a lot of steps that patients have to go, to get from even just getting a diagnosis to getting treatment and having patients move through that period of time, which is we hope usually four to six weeks in a sort of step-by-step manner can be extremely eliminating. So we really are trying to condense those things so patients can meet all the specialists, they need to get all the tests that they need to get in maybe one or two concise visits and then get into care, and lastly, as you mentioned, not having access to what we call multidisciplinary conferences is a limitation because there are more and more nuanced ways that lung cancer is presenting and being treated, that needs to be discussed between a surgeon and radiation oncologists and the medical oncologists, preferably all in the same setting, all at the same time. So having access to those clinics where we can have a really high-level discussion about the best thing to do for a patient, I feel is a significant barrier, especially for our patients with advanced disease.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
Thank you so much. Wow, you have given us so much to think about and I appreciate your thorough answer. One of the things that I’m struck with as you talk about all of these steps and the fact that ideally, they need to be undergone within a certain time period, of course, it’s time-sensitive. And you mentioned navigating, and certainly, that’s something that I deal with on a regular basis, just the challenges of navigating through each one of those steps can be extremely difficult, you’ve gone through a lot of the barriers that patients and their family caregivers may face. Let’s talk about some of the solutions. Are there a few solutions that you can suggest for overcoming some of these barriers that you just described?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Yeah, I think from the patient’s perspective, there are a number of things you can do to really help yourself. Number one is a good healthy dose of research, that means getting online, Googling, finding lung cancer experts, preferably in your region, finding out what their interests are, what are the things that they typically research and take care of, and then finding a way to get in contact with them. I think that is really step number one, it’s finding someone who specializes in the disease, and then to find someone that you actually get along, someone who you have a relationship with, a truly therapeutic relationship and invest in that person, and if they’re the right person for you, whether it be personality fit, whether it be background, you will find a relationship with them that will actually help you get through that process. I would also say many programs actually have nurse navigators who are people that help you navigate this process, that is quite literally why they are part of the health system, so if you can find programs and have nurse navigators, they can really be instrumental in setting up appointments that are either overlapped right after one another, all in the same place, things that really help smooth the edges of getting all the work I’ve done at on time.
And again, I would also recommend the patients, I would try to stack your appointments or stack your visits so that they are not quite so spread out over space and time, because a visit, usually it takes a few days to get a result, which then takes a few days to get a course of action, which then can sometimes provoke another test.
So, the more times than things are stacked together and information just a get to get in big packets, I think really the better for moving through the process.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
I appreciate that. I think what I’m hearing in your answers is really the importance of patients putting themselves in the driver’s seat, which is another thing that I strongly advocate for. I think many patients and family members don’t see that as their role, and they don’t understand and appreciate the value of doing these things that you just talked about, doing your own research and finding providers with whom you connect it’s so incredibly important, especially when it comes to cancer and other serious diseases. So, I want to switch gears a little bit and talk about racial and health disparities, ethnic and health disparities, specifically in lung cancer care. I know that you have done some research in this area, and certainly being a person of color, this is something that I would imagine you relate to, so we know that the CDC and many other healthcare organizations have now declared racism a public health crisis, and certainly in 2021, we continue to see worse outcomes for cancer and many other chronic illnesses in people of color, so I’m curious, what do you think are the notable health disparities that are consistently seen in treating BIPOC patients living with lung cancer?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Yeah, unfortunately, this is an area of interest of mine. And it turns out that the disparities are literally every single stage. There’s not an aspect of lung cancer care, which there is not a significant disparity that hinders the ability of minority patients to get better care, period at all stages. So overall survival for lung cancer for black patient is worse than white patients, even though black patients get diagnosed on average two to three years younger than their white counterparts. Black patients are less likely to get surgical therapy for early-stage disease, which is the actual care for an early-stage disease dates than black patients, than white patients, that gap has been narrowing over the last 20 years, but it is by no means closed. Black patients are unfortunately less likely to get an appropriate work-up to get the indicated tests. They are also less likely to get the chemotherapy when it is indicated, and they are less likely to be enrolled in clinical trials. So, literally at every step there is a significant inequity that affects black patients, and I think it’s really disheartening to see in a field where lung cancer is the most common killer and cancer, and frankly, there are lots and lots of patients who have options, who have good options that never get investigated and never get delivered.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
That is extremely heartbreaking, and it’s sad to hear that we see the same disparities in lung cancer that we see with every other chronic condition, with every other cancer, certainly what we’ve seen recently with COVID-19 as well, and it really underscores what you said previously, which is the importance of being an advocate for yourself and doing your research and making sure that you really are getting the best care, which could be difficult when you’re struggling with your cancer diagnosis. Sometimes I get angry, I feel like we’re putting so much responsibility and so much burden on the patient. With that said, what are some things that patients of color can do in order to protect themselves from these inequities that you’ve talked about, starting with diagnosis and treatment, what can we do? What can patients of color do?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
So, I think the number one thing is to ask questions, the number one thing is to say, what are my options? What am I dealing with? What should I do or what shouldn’t I do? And to really make sure you get the most at that time when you see a physician, because that is really what we’re there for apart from the surgery, I’m really there to be an educator. I teach as much as I operate on a daily basis whether it be the medical training is whether in my patients, my job is to communicate information back and forth, so you really want to spend the time asking questions and getting as much information out, as much as you can. Number two is, see a specialist. There’s also very good data to indicate that as a black patient, if you see a board-certified thoracic surgeon, you are more likely to get lung cancer surgery than if you were to see a surgeon of unknown specialization, a general surgeon. So clearly the training gives specialist the ability to make finer determinations and discernments that I think in large part favor black and minority patients, so you wanna find someone who deals with these disease processes all the time because they’re gonna look at it in a much higher level and look at it with a lot more granularity.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
Just have to repeat what you said, you said, I teach as much as I operate. That just really resonated with me, and I think that… That’s so incredibly important. Doctor means teacher, right? I think that’s the Latin… We are obligated to teach our patients, so I just really appreciate that that’s something that you incorporate in your daily practice. If we shift gears a little bit and talk about access and some of the concerns about treatment access for lung cancer patients, which you’ve actually alluded to, we know that sometimes these barriers that patients face actually limit their access to treatments, and you indicated surgery as being the mainstay and some difficulties with that, so how can we empower patients so that they don’t feel limited in their care, and how do we make them aware of these treatment options that are available, so that if they are in an office and maybe something’s being offered, but that’s not actually, the standard of care, how do we empower them to get that information and then to act on it?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Yeah, so number one, which is something I think people do and they don’t realize how valuable it is, bring a friend to the appointment, don’t come by yourself, because you are in an incredibly vulnerable position, you’ve learned or are learning something incredibly emotionally charged and usually very scary. So, you want to bring someone who obviously is gonna love you and care about you, but has enough emotional distance from it that they can be your advocate, they can ask those questions in the room that you may just not be there mentally to ask. Number two, never be afraid to get a second opinion, if you’re lucky enough to live in a populous area with multiple health systems, get a copy of your chart, get a copy of your data, get your disc, make an appointment to see another specialist in another health system and see what they say. Because at the very least, if the information is concordant, then you’re gonna feel pretty good about saying, okay, then I should just go where I think I feel best or who I have the best sort of relationship with. And again, if you are not lucky enough to have that opportunity, I would be very aggressive about seeing if telehealth is an option to reach out to someone who is a specialist, I’ve had not happened to me in the past, I remember I had a woman who telehealth, me from Ohio, because she’d actually read one of my papers about lung cancer, and she sent her scans, uploaded them, I looked at them and I gave her my opinion, and this is the new age or medicine.
This is where we’re at now. This is a viable option, and even if telehealth isn’t an option, you can always just get on the phone. As a lung cancer specialist, a lot of the information I need can be garnered from test scans and images, so frankly, the physical exam has some role, but is not the mainstay of how a lot of the decisions are made. So even if I see your scans and I talk to you, I can give you an opinion over the phone, it takes me 15-20 minutes, and a lot of times, those visits may not even be charged, depending on who you actually ask to give you an opinion.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
Wow. Free of charge. Okay, I see you’re teaching me something that I didn’t know. I’m a huge proponent of second opinions, I’ve talked to so many patients and family caregivers who think that they’re offending their doctor if they ask for a second opinion, so I appreciate that you brought that to the forefront and you deserve to have multiple opinions as you’re making these very important life-changing decisions. So, thank you for sharing that. This is a perfect segue. You mentioned telehealth, and we know that one of the barriers to receiving care, and you’ve indicated that in terms of having access to a multi-disciplinary team, having access to thoracic surgeons as opposed to general surgeons, so we know that that is impacted by where we live, and that often our geographic location can actually be a barrier to the receipt of quality care, so I’d love for you to just talk a little bit about how patients who may be in more remote locations can make sure that they are also receiving appropriate care for their lung cancer.
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Yeah, I think this is a very substantive challenge, I think this is one of the holes in healthcare, there’s these regions in the country where you just are not gonna have access to any number of surgical sub-specialist or radiation oncologist, or lung cancer specific oncologists. I think that is a really big challenge. I think we have actually learned through the pandemic that these physical barriers really are not the reason to not get the best care, so I think those patients should be exquisitely interested in telehealth and in phone calls, and I think most healthcare systems now, because the reimbursements have been approved for telehealth and actually now built infrastructure to support it as an ongoing concept. So now, if you are a patient that’s in Arizona and you want to talk to a doctor who’s in New Jersey, you can do that, you can make that happen. If you find someone, you Google them, you find a friend in that area who know someone, you can call their office and say, I want to have a telehealth visit, and as long as you have broadband internet and a phone, you can do it. You can have that conversation.
So, I would advocate for people to really make sure that you at least feel like people in the sort of local regional area that you can perhaps get to maybe two, three hours away, but you can imagine a scenario where you can get there, you can try and establish some level of care and some level of rapport with them. I think that’s something that has really opened, has been one of the few good things to come out of the pandemic.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
I was gonna say the exact same thing. That is one… There haven’t been a lot of positive things, but that certainly is one of the positive outcomes of the pandemic, is this surge, and it’s not that we already had the capability, but it certainly was not being used to its maximum capacity. I appreciate that. So, speaking of telemedicine and COVID, think one of the challenges that patients and often care partners have is understanding when is a telemedicine or telehealth visit appropriate versus when do you actually need to go see that doctor in person, so… Can you help clarify that?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Yeah, so I think in general, even if you start with the telehealth is, I think there’s very little downside to telehealth for almost anyone in general, because a lot of the information can be garnered from the patient record, from their scans. I think in general; it gives you 85% of what you need out of that interaction, and it may be more convenient for the patient, a lot of times it’s actually more convenient for the doctors, doctors have now found ways to work from home. They do have to have their clinic from home, it’s a much more relaxed environment than more efficient. I think there are times like for instance, I have to make decisions about offering surgery to patients who I consider to be moderate or high risk, I think there is a benefit and having that patient come and see me in the office because they have to somehow pass what we call the eyeball test, and that is a little bit of where this disparity comes in in lung cancer surgery, because it depends on who’s eyeball is looking at you, making your determination about what they think is gonna happen with you in surgery.
I remember… Actually, one of my favorite patients ever. She had data that did not look like she would tolerate surgery, everything about her data did not look favorable. And I saw her, I remember seeing her in person, and you could see the spark in her eye and energy that she had, and I said, you know what, we’re gonna do it. And she did great, she did phenomenally well. And that is a case where if you’re in the population of patients that may be slightly more moderate, slightly more high risk, and you need someone to really look you in the eye and you say, I’m going to do what it takes to get through this. I think that’s the patient where the in-touch, in-person visit really is that extra touch that can be benefited.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
Wow, I love what you said about the spark in her eye and also how you connected that to health disparities, and I don’t know the race or ethnicity of the patient that you’re describing, but we certainly know that that makes a difference, and I just wonder if that had been a different physician, would they have seen that same spark? And I think it just goes back to what we were talking about earlier, and the importance of finding a physician or health care provider with whom you connect, someone that actually respects you, someone that listens to you and see you as a whole person. So, the fact that you were willing to go beyond that data on her chart, which screamed, this is a poor surgical candidate, met her in person, and something about her let you know that she was gonna be okay.
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Agree. And that’s why in medicine and surgery is still art at the end of the day, it’s still an art. You make decisions, best informed decisions, but there’s a lot of it that is still really special and mystical in a way, and I think having that in-person interactions will let you practice that and it’s exactly what you said, you want to have a really nice relationship with the physician, especially anyone that’s gonna be doing anything that might be invasive or dangerous because for the most part, you meet someone for 45 minutes and then you sign up for what could be a life-threatening event. So, you, the physician and the patient should feel really good about that interaction and whatever that energy is, it’s really important, it’s a little bit kind of sacred, I think, and I think it’s really valuable to invest in that if you don’t like the surgeon, you really don’t feel like it’s a good fit or you don’t like your oncologist, find someone else. You’ll do better in the long run, for sure.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
That is so incredibly important. I agree, 100%. So much of healing is beyond just the nuts and bolts of the medical care that we provide, or in your case, the surgical care, there’s so much more to that, that’s not really well studied, but that relationship and that connection is key.
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Critical, and that’s not to say that necessarily the person has to be like the warmest, friendlies, the most fun person you ever met, some people prefer a more yes ma’am, no ma’am, clear cut, well-defined boundaries of a relationship. Some people prefer a big hug and a laugh and a joke, so if you’re getting what you need, that’s exactly what you need, and if you’re not getting what you need, you should think about your other options.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
Love it, love it. Alright, Dr. Okusanya, so we’re gonna talk now about staying on that theme of empowering patients, we know that all of these barriers that we’ve been discussing can impact and limit treatment options, and we know that late diagnoses or not getting the proper care at the outset will lead to more complications and unfortunately, even death in some situations, and as you’ve alluded to, we know that patients who are educated about their illness, patients who take an active role in their medical care receive better care, they have better outcomes. So, what are some key questions that patients and care partners should ask at the very beginning when they are first beginning this journey with lung cancer?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
So, I would say… Question number one that I would ask is like, do you specialize in this? Is something that you do on the regular basis? What percentage of your practice is lung cancer care? You would really like an answer that’s more than 50%, you would like someone who sees lung cancer patients and take care of lung cancer patients as a matter of routine. And something I would also say as a patient, you kind of want your care to be routine, you don’t wanna be someone where things are just being figured out for the first time, you really wanna have someone who does this all the time. The other questions I would ask are, can you tell me what all the options are, not just the one you’re offering to me, I really wanna know what all the options are, and I always tell patients the options are really very broad. A physician chose the option is one, you may wanna not do anything that is an option, you know saying We know it’s there; we understand and we’re gonna watch it or not do anything is a very reasonable option they should tell you about biopsies or surgery or non-invasive therapeutic modalities.
You really wanna say, I want you to give me the laundry list, all the things that are possible in the institution that I’m sitting in. And then I would also ask, what are the things that you are not considering before that might be options. What are the things that maybe you’ve ruled out in your mind and can you tell me more about that? Because we’re very physician, they’re very good at heuristics, really good at skipping steps and making next logical jobs, so it’s good to ask one of those steps that you skipped in your life and why did you skip them? And then the last thing I would ask is, Is this the kind of case that should be discussed in a multi-disciplinary clinic or conference? Is there anybody else I should talk to about this problem? And I think if you can ask those questions and feel very confident about asking those questions again, most practitioners who are high level and specializing, this will not be offended, they will be glad that you’re asking the question, it will be a relief for both of you. I think if you can ask those questions, you can really help to eliminate some of those ascites and really get on the right trajectory from the beginning.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
Those are such important questions, starting with the first one you provided, which is… Do you specialize in this? I think that we spend a lot of time sometimes betting, other professionals, even hair stylists, or if we wanna get our car fixed, we wanna go to the person that specializes and whatever is wrong with that particular problem, but we don’t always take such care with our most precious commodity, our body. So, I think that’s so incredibly important that we ask that question, and it’s not to make bad comments about those who don’t, but people like yourself have trained for many years, and there’s something to be said about that when this is your area of focus, and this is what you do day in, day out. So, I love that, I also really love what you said about kind of getting inside of the brain of the doctor, because you’re right, we’re skipping steps and we’re going through algorithms, but we don’t often bring the patient into that process, and so I really love the idea of the patients questioning, are there things that you didn’t consider and why? And really having a full understanding of all of those treatment options, and maybe if the doctor has erroneously ruled out one of those possibilities based on maybe an assumption that gives the patient an opportunity to clarify that.
That is very powerful.
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
And I would say, as a patient, oftentimes, we wanna describe very positive feelings towards your physician, it’s a notch a very natural thing to do because you want them to be good, so that eventually you’ll be good and they’ll take good care of you. You wanna ascribe those positive thoughts, and I think that’s very reasonable, but we should approach that with a little bit of question because this is someone who has a lot of information and a lot of knowledge, and you wanna make sure you are getting everything in the middle, so it doesn’t get lost in translation. You wanna make sure you’re there for that conversation.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
Absolutely. What advice do you give to patients that you see so that they can feel empowered Dr. Okusanya? Is there any specific advice that you give when you see patients and things that just helped them to take this active role that you’ve been describing?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
Number one, I tell patients to bring someone with them to their appointments, someone who can stand by as within reason someone who can be there to listen as well, ’cause usually I say, if I tell you 100 things in an appointment which can legitimately have, I could give you 100 unique points of information and in 1 45-minute visit. If you catch 30 of them or 35 of them, you really understand that. I think that’s a lot because they’re very emotionally charged. So, hopefully someone else, it’s with you, maybe catches another 30 or 40, and that gets you to a point where you can really sit down later and understand. I encourage patients to take notes to write things down, and if they want to, to record, to have audio recording of the session, I wouldn’t say anything to you now that I wouldn’t say in a month or in a year, or anywhere else. I’m gonna tell you exactly what I think and I… And if I have uncertainty, I will expose that uncertainty, I will let you know that this is a case that could go either way. And this is a piece of information that I’m looking back and forward between these two options and that really helps the patients later on go back and say, Did I really hear that right? Did I really understand it, right? So that you can feel like you’re getting the best care, and I really think that you have to make sure that you feel comfortable with the provider.
I think that’s just the number one thing. Are you happy with them? Do you like the way they comported themselves? Did you like the way they spoke to you? Did you like their staff? Also remember, you’re likely gonna be interacting with their staff as much as you interact with the physician, so the other people in the office, the front desk people, the nurse practitioners, the medical assistants, those are the people that you’re gonna spend a lot of time talking to. Did you have a good rapport with them? Also, all that stuff counts to make sure that you’re getting the best experience possible and that you can really be an advocate for yourself.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
That is incredible. Well, it’s just about time for us to wrap up, I just wanna reiterate, you share so many pearls today, but I just wanna reiterate a few of them, and they really resonate with me as a former caregiver and as a health advocate, but that’s the importance of asking questions, the importance of bringing a buddy, and I appreciate that, particularly in your field, when we go into a doctor’s office and the word cancer is stated, everything else goes out of the window, and even in less threatening situations, there’s data that shows that… I think about 20% to 25% of what we say as physicians is actually retained, so certainly when you get a bad diagnosis, that number is even lower, so bringing somebody with you who is not necessarily emotionally detached, but they can literally kind of be the note taker, and they may even pick up on some nuances and things that you may have missed as a patient is so incredibly important. I love that you’ve offered the option of recording, I think that’s also another tool that many patients and family members aren’t aware of, and I think there’s an assumption, and it’s true to some degree that doctors don’t wanna be recorded, but knowing that that is an option.
The fact that the care that we receive really is impacted by whether or not the person specializes in lung cancer, a thoracic surgeon, and being empowered to ask that question, is this your specialty? How often do you see patients like me and being empowered to ask those questions that ultimately won’t lead to improve care is just so incredibly important, and I think just everything that you’ve shared that really allows the patients and the caregivers to understand just how important their role is you’re the one that’s going to take out the cancer and you’re the one that’s going to get them better, but there’s so many things that happen before that step, before they are on that operating room table that is so important. Do you have any closing thoughts that you’d like to share with us, Dr. Okusanya?
Dr. Olugbenga Okusanya:
I think for patients and their advocates, I think it’s really important number that you’re putting together a health care team. You’re putting together a group of people like the avengers. You’re putting together a bunch of people to come together to help you deal with this health problem. You are entering into a therapeutic relationship, so that relationship has to be healthy in order for you to have the best possible outcome, you should feel good about, you know, your doctor is gonna be very skilled, became very knowledgeable, and just like we talked about before. You really wanna find someone who has the heart of a teacher, someone who can sit down and explain it to you in a way that’s gonna be digestible and that is gonna be actionable. So I think if patients and advocates remember that you wanna build a really solid, a really healthy relationship with someone who’s gonna help you take care your health, I think if you do that, you’re going to be in excellent care.
Dr. Nicole Rochester:
Awesome. Well, I really enjoyed this time. Thank you so much, Dr. Okusanya, you have given us so much useful information, and I wanna thank all of you again for tuning into the Patient Empowerment Network program.
https://powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/How-Can-I-Get-the-Best-Lung-Cancer-Care-No-Matter-Where-I-Live-1.png600600Kara Rayburnhttps://www.powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/New-Logo-300x126.pngKara Rayburn2021-07-29 08:06:062021-08-03 14:48:05How Can I Get the Best Lung Cancer Care No Matter Where I Live?
Noted lung cancer experts, Dr. Lecia Sequist, Marisa Wittebort, a lung cancer advocate with a very rare mutation, ROS1, and lung cancer advocate, Janet Freeman Daily joined this program to provide an expert perspective on the impact of patient involvement in research and how both lung cancer patients and care partners can contribute to bringing new medicines to the market.
Transcript:
Andrew Schorr:
And greetings from Carlsbad, California, near San Diego. I’m Andrew Schorr from Patient Power. Welcome to this Patient Empowerment Network program. I’m so excited. It’s where we can learn how can lung cancer patients stay involved in research and innovate new treatments to benefit the lung cancer community.
Let’s meet our guests. First of all, we wanted to have Marisa Wittebort, who is a ROS1 lung cancer patient, but unfortunately Marisa is having a medical procedure and so she couldn’t be with us. But joining us from New York City is her sister, Jess, who’s been with her every step of the way. Jess, thank you so much for joining us. And, first of all, how is your sister doing?
Jessica Wittebort:
Yes, she’s doing good. Thanks so much, Andrew for having me join today. Marisa’s good. She has another pesky effusion that needs more attention today, so I’m joining you, but thank you very much.
Andrew Schorr:
Okay. Well, all our best to Marisa.
Jessica Wittebort:
Yeah, I appreciate that.
Andrew Schorr:
You know, the role of a care partner such as yourself, a sister, a spouse, and other family members is so critical. Okay.
Let’s also meet someone else who has been living with lung cancer personally and that is our old friend–she’s not old, though–Janet Freeman-Daily who joins us from Seattle. Janet also happens to have the ROS1 mutation like Marisa, and she is so active in going to medical conferences all around the world. Janet, thanks for being with us.
Please remember the opinions expressed on Patient Power are not necessarily the views of our sponsors, contributors, partners or Patient Power. Our discussions are not a substitute for seeking medical advice or care from your own doctor. That’s how you’ll get care that’s most appropriate for you.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
Thanks for inviting me, Andrew.
Andrew Schorr:
Okay. And, Janet, you–how many conferences have you spoken to that are medical conferences, but you’re a patient who gets up and says, here’s our perspective? How many?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
I think it’s five or six at this point.
Andrew Schorr:
I bet. And we’re going to get–we’re going to talk more about the importance of that. So you’re one side of the coin, as is Marisa, and then we have a leading cancer researcher joining us from Mass General in Boston devoted to people with lung cancer. That’s Lecia Sequist. Dr. Sequist, thanks so much for being with us.
Dr. Sequist:
Thank you for having me. This is really a treat.
Andrew Schorr:
Okay. So you’ve been at medical conferences where you’ve heard people like Janet speak. Does that inspire you when you are actually at what would otherwise be just thousands of cancer specialists, but the patient perspective is put right front and center?
Dr. Sequist:
It’s very inspiring, as I’m sure we’ll talk about. It was especially palpable this year at the World Lung Cancer Conference in Toronto just about five or six weeks ago. Janet was there. There were so many lung cancer advocates there, and this is a conference that’s focused only on lung cancer, and it was really exciting.
But I would say Janet and I have been running into each other at the hallways of medical conferences for many years, and it is always really interesting to get the patient perspective about a big result that was just presented maybe an hour earlier. And I love running into people at meetings and talking to them about it. It really helps inform our research.
Andrew Schorr:
That’s what I was going to ask–go ahead, Janet.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
It’s also very nice to run into a doctor after a presentation and say, what did they just say?
Andrew Schorr:
Right. Right. So do you, Dr. Sequist besides inspiring you, and then there are people in labs who don’t even–you see patients, but there are other people who are only in labs, do you feel that this communication with people who are living it can actually help get information, promote collaboration and accelerate us towards what we hope will be cures?
Dr. Sequist:
Oh, absolutely. It’s a really vital two-way communication road. I think having patient advocates learn more about the research process, both the pros and cons about went research process, and see what all is involved and what hurdles we have to deal with all the time as researchers can be really helpful. We need their help advocating to get rid of some hurdles and the obstacles in our way.
And there is nothing more informative than finding out what really is important to patients, especially when you’re developing a new treatment, hearing from them about what they value, what they–you know, someone who is not living with it may think that a certain side effect is a big deal, yet someone who is taking the medicine will say, you know, actually that’s–I can deal with that if it’s going to help me live longer. And finding out where that balance lies is really important and not something you can just guess if you’re not in the shoes of a patient.
Andrew Schorr:
So, Marisa, you’ve been every step of the way with your–rather, excuse me, Jessica.
Andrew Schorr:
All right. You’ve been with Marisa every step of the way, and unfortunately she was diagnosed in 2015 at what, age–
Jessica Wittebort:
She just turned 30, yeah.
Andrew Schorr:
She just turned 30. You’re her big sister. From the family perspective what do you hope, with closer collaboration with researchers, practitioners like Dr. Sequist, what do you hope?
Jessica Wittebort:
Well, gosh, I think we’re really just hoping to expedite research, and we want to be part of that journey. You know, I think when Marisa goes in to see her oncologist and he gives her a high five because she’s doing well, you know at a granular level that that relationship and that everybody is pushing for the same thing.
I think a little bit that gets lost in translation sometimes when you can get swallowed by the information that comes out of a conference if you’re not carefully, right, so learning how to translate that information into something tangible and consumable and being able to respond back to your healthcare professionals I think is just that bridge that’s essential to moving things forward.
Andrew Schorr:
And you’ve been to some conferences. I saw you at the Biden Cancer Summit, which had a lot of patients and patient advocates there, but I think you’ve been to–where did you go? To Austria or someplace?
Jessica Wittebort:
Yeah, I went to World Lung in Austria, to meet Janet, frankly. No, I mean, to see some incredible work in progress and some incredible work, and it’s a tremendous amount of content. I probably understood, you know, 5 percent of it, but at least it got me there starting to understand what the language was, starting to understand what the potential impact of clinical trials are, starting to feel just a tremendous amount of hope that lives through science, and to see my colleagues. You know, Janet is pretty much family, so I think these conferences, it’s incredible when patients not only part–you know, really participating, I think that’s a big deal.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
It was also really great for the–there were several ROS1ders there, people who had ROS1 cancer dealing with it at the end of conference, and we got to go up en masse and talk to the researchers about what they were doing, which was educational for us, and I think most of them felt fairly enthused about it too.
Andrew Schorr:
Janet, you’ve spoken at some of these congresses. What do you want to say to that clinical and research audience? What are you trying to bring forward to them as somebody living now, what, four or five years with stage IV lung cancer?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
I was diagnosed seven and a half years ago.
Andrew Schorr:
Seven and a half years ago. So, thanks god, treatment, and you’ve been in a trial for a long time, has just been remarkable for you, life-extending. What’s the message you bring when you speak?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
Well, it depends on the setting that I’m in and what I’ve been asked to speak about. It’s been different topics. Once I’ve talked about value in cancer care and the cost of cancer drugs. Once I’ve talked about the research that the patients with ROS1 were doing. I’ve also talked about the importance of goals of care discussions with the doctors to talk about what our treatment options are and what our chances are of them being effective so we could make our own choices about treatment rather than having the doctor decide what we’re going to do.
There’s a lot of different topics out there that patients can share their background and perspectives on. I think one of my more favorite things is running into Dr. (?) Jean Kooey who created the drug that I’m on and that Marisa started with and that Marisa then took next. She’s the lead chemist on those designs, and we ran into her at the poster session at ASCO and she got to meet the patients that her drug (?) Inaudible, which was a really big deal for her. And we’re all kind of awe struck, fan girl, oh, my god.
Andrew Schorr:
So, Dr. Sequist, does that make a difference? Because there are maybe many thousands of people working around the world on lung cancer now, some people only in labs, and never meet a patient like with a more rare mutation like ROS1. Does that make a difference when that connection can happen?
Dr. Sequist:
Oh, absolutely. I do think it’s really important for people who are working on the basic science aspects of cancer and in a laboratory, a little bit removed from the patients, to meet patients and survivors and see what their work is leading to. At Mass General we routinely have tours of our lab so that the people that work in the lab, not just the lead scientists but even the techs who are there for 10, 12 hours a day working hard for them to see how their work can really make a difference. And I know lots of other centers will do that as well.
Andrew Schorr:
So we’re getting into this age of personalized medicine, and I was in Boston a week or so ago and whether it’s out of MIT or your partners group in Boston, there’s all this computing power coming into play to try to understand what is our personal situation with a cancer and how do you develop or do you have medicines or trials that line up with that. And that’s been a real work of yours, right, is to try to look at the subsets of lung cancer. How are we doing in that? We talk about ROS1 and you have KRAS and ALK and EGFR and all these different types and then some types that haven’t been identified yet, right?
Dr. Sequist:
That’s right. I think if you take the long view and look at 10 or 15 years ago where the field of lung cancer was, it is a totally different landscape today. We have come so far in being able to personalize not only the clinical trials that are available for patients but then subsequently the approved treatments. And there’s been a lot of exciting advances in lung cancer that are a little bit less personalized lately, specifically immune therapy. That works with a bit of a broader brush, but the success in the personalized targeted therapy is unparalleled in other tumors types at the moment, and so I think everyone that works in lung cancer is really proud of how much the field has moved forward.
Andrew Schorr:
But you’re doing detective work, so some of these genes weren’t originally identified, and you have probably a lot more to go, so what’s going on now where for people where a gene wasn’t identified maybe you’ll have that? You’ll find out what the factors are or if somebody switches from one driver gene to another?
Dr. Sequist:
Yeah, there’s a lot of important things that go into that. One is being able to test each patient, and there are now several ways that you can test for the key mutations. The gold standard is still testing tumor biopsy, but liquid biopsies are also coming really into the forefront ready for prime time. Janet and I actually collaborated–well, Janet led the collaboration on an article that we wrote together about liquid biopsies and how it’s–and demystifying some of these things for patient audiences.
But looking at the tumor is important, and then actually important is getting patients to the right trials. You’re not going to be able to prove that something works if you can only find one patient with that mutation. You really have to reach all over the country and sometimes all over the world to find patients specifically for a situation. And that’s one area where patient advocacy groups have been extremely helpful helping bring patients together with the trials that fit their situation.
Andrew Schorr:
So tell me–go ahead. I was just going to–Janet, what’s the message then to people watching so that they can get the care or the testing or help involved to push research further? What do you want to say to people?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
Well, I think one of the valuable things that Lecia brought out is that we are developing or identifying new mutations all the time. When I was first diagnosed nobody knew about ROS1. It hadn’t even been published yet. And when I found out about it and I brought the article to my local doctors in the community setting they didn’t know how to test for it. And yet when I got tested and they found that I had ROS1 I have been on a drug now that I’m coming up to my six-year anniversary for my clinical trial, and I’m still no evidence of disease.
So what I would tell people is it’s really important to keep track of the research and to stay on top of the new developments. And so the patient communities are really good at that because you might find a new option that didn’t exist when you were first diagnosed.
Andrew Schorr:
And so that’s something that you, Jess, and your sister do all the time, right? And so you know you have this ROS1 version of lung cancer for your sister, you don’t know if something will change or other factors will come in, so you keep your ear to the ground very much and connect with the community.
Jessica Wittebort:
Absolutely. So tactically what do we do? We have our Google alerts always set to any medicines that we’ve heard about, any clinical trials that we’ve heard about, any researchers that are working in the space. For us, we have a ROS1 community online which is–we have a public one, and we also have a private one on Facebook where we’re able to just very openly bounce ideas around and talk about things we don’t understand and get those concepts in our heads.
And oftentimes those relationships lead to actually meeting off line. So most cities that Marisa or I visit for whatever reason, whether it’s going to see a doctor or going to an event, we get to meet somebody offline as well. So finding–keeping your ear to the ground, yes. We have great luxury of really–Marisa has a great team, so they will always drive that for her. But I think it’s also something that she is always very keen to share the information that she’s getting so that other people are privileged to have that information as well.
Andrew Schorr:
Go ahead.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
And a few key researchers like Dr. Sequist, Dr. Camidge, Dr. Shaw, at a few key universities are the experts in some of these driver oncogenes, and they’ve been very generous in their time in allowing us to e-mail them questions and say, gee, this question came up in the group, and we don’t have any experience with that. Could you give us an idea of what to do? So the researchers are key to this.
Andrew Schorr:
They are. And, Dr. Sequist, thank you for your devotion. I have a question for you, and that is most people though don’t get treatment at University of Colorado or Mass General or Dana-Farber or City of Hope or MD Anderson, and we could list a bunch of the leading institutions. Most people are told they have lung cancer, they’re at a community oncology practice, they’re terrified, and you’re leading change. You’re on the leading edge, all of you, in lung cancer, but that sometimes hasn’t quite–I don’t want to say trickle down, but you’re on the podium at World Lung or ASCO and you’re talking to a thousand doctors sitting there and we’re hoping that it gets to them, and a patient walks into their clinic, though and maybe some of this isn’t brought to bear.
What can the patient or the family member do so that this knowledge that’s emerging in lung cancer can be brought to bear at the community level? What’s the patient or the family member’s role today?
Dr. Sequist:
I think medicine is changing, and we are no longer in an era where any one doctor can know everything about medicine. I mean, we haven’t been in that era for a long time. And it’s very difficult to be a community oncology, a general oncologist today. There are so many new treatments and new genes and new strategies coming out for every type of cancer in rapid succession, so keeping up with all of lung cancer advancements plus all the other tumor types is quite a challenge.
That’s why I think that now more than ever as cancer gets so complicated it does work really well for patients to be able to connect with other patients and lung cancer specialists online, through activities like this, through many other educational activities that are available and advocacy groups because–just because a community oncologist has never heard of ROS1 I don’t think makes them a bad community oncologist, but hopefully the message is getting out to the community to partner with super sub-sub specialized academic centers if a mutation like this is found in a patient.
Andrew Schorr:
Okay. So, Janet, what do you tell people, what do you want to tell our viewers who were probably treated at least initially at a community center and they have no clue whether they have some subtype, rare or not, of be lung cancer and what to do about it? Janet, (?) Inaudible.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
If a person has lung cancer and it’s non-small cell lung cancer you should have gotten genomic testing at some point, and if you didn’t you need to ask your doctor about that. If your doctor is not familiar with it, and some of the general practitioners and community oncologists may not be as comfortable with it as other lung cancer specialists, then get a second opinion, preferably at a major academic cancer center.
If you want to learn more about this there are a large number of online patient groups where you can ask questions and get educated about this, or you can go to websites of some of the lung cancer advocacy organizations like LUNGevity, Lung Cancer Foundation of America. They have a good deal of information where you can start learning about things to get yourself educated on the topic. It’s–I still hear patients who are stage IV lung cancer, and their doctor sent them home on hospice without ever doing genomic testing. It’s really important that you make sure you get the tests that are in the standard of care.
Andrew Schorr:
So, Dr. Sequist, just back to you. This genomic testing is to see, is there an oncogene or cancer gene that’s driving your cancer that either an approved or maybe a clinical trial experimental medicine may target, right? Okay?
Dr. Sequist:
That’s correct. And, as Janet was saying, it’s vitally important for every patient that’s diagnosed to get tested at a minimum for the genes that correspond to FDA-approved medications, but there are several second-tier mutations that I believe everyone should be tested for because there are clinical trials that even if it’s not available at the community site where they first sought care hopefully it’s available someplace that’s not too terribly far from where they live.
Andrew Schorr:
Okay. So I’m sure that Janet follows this and Jess of course, can the genes change? So, in other words, in lung cancer if Mrs. Jones is seen to have a KRAS mutation, just to pull one out, early on, does that always remain what’s driving her lung cancer, or might it change and there might be a need to test again?
Dr. Sequist:
I think we’re all experts in this, so we can everybody chime in as well. If the cancer truly has a driver oncogene what that means is that every single cancer cell in the tumor carries that genetic mark. Probably the very first cancer cell that came up in the body had it, and then every daughter cell that was created afterwards carries this mark. As patients–so typically these are EGFR, ALK, ROS, MET, RET. These are the ones that we have targets for, BRAF, targeted drugs.
Now, once a patient is on a targeted drug you can think of it like evolution, like survival of the fittest. So a drug is exerting pressure on the cancer, many cells are dying, but sometimes a cell will have a certain characteristic that allows it to live through the drug treatment, and then from there a resistant tumor can grow. And so second mutations or second pathways can become activated after patients have been treated with certain drugs. And the more drugs that people have been exposed to over time the more different subpopulations that might have varying signatures come up.
But you never lose that original mutation. It’s something that is always carried forward. It’s just what else piles on top of it across the different arms. I describe it as different arms of the family or cousins. Like this tumor is a cousin of that tumor because they do have some different characteristics but still that same core characteristic.
Andrew Schorr:
And you were saying about retesting?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
So some drugs we know that if they stop working there’s another drug that you can go to, but as we develop more and more drugs and EGFR, with which Dr. Sequist is very familiar, has more drugs than the rest of us. When patients take certain of those drugs second or third line they actually might develop a different mutation and will have to get retested to find out how to treat that. We’re right on the forefront of learning about how the genomics of cancer works, and we learn new things all the time.
Andrew Schorr:
So, Jess, you and your sister have sought out eminent specialists at major centers, but, as you said, not everybody goes there. What advice do you have to patients and family members, especially family members because sometimes the patient is so terrified just being led through care and the family member has to pick up the mantle? What would you say so that the loved one gets the best care?
Jessica Wittebort:
For us the most profound change has been to find a specialist at an academic institution. I think if you don’t–if you’re not able to do that, it is really important to find your patient group and start asking, what are they doing. What information can you get your head around? And keep your head above water because I really do believe there’s so much hope and there’s so much energy right now and momentum in this space that it’s important to just keep finding, keep looking for the information. And if you’re not getting the answers that you need or are too complicated figure out a way to not feel shy about asking again.
Andrew Schorr:
Amen. So you mentioned earlier, Janet, about getting tested, right?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
Yes.
Andrew Schorr:
So what if the test doesn’t identify anybody? Should they be forlorn? I’m going to ask Dr. Sequist, too. If one of these genes that we rattled off doesn’t show up or driver gene should they say, oh, my god I’m out of luck?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
No, not necessarily. Targeted therapies are easy to take in that you can take a pill once or twice a day, but they’re not the only new therapy that’s come out, and most of the patients who do not have a targeted treatment can take immunotherapy. That’s the new standard of care, and it works really well. I’ll let Dr. Sequist talk to that.
Andrew Schorr:
Let’s understand that, Dr. Sequist. So if somebody doesn’t have any of those genes but both of you have mentioned immunotherapy, how does that work and how does that help?
Dr. Sequist:
So one quick point before we get to immune therapy is that it’s really important if you are told that you don’t have any specific mutations that you make sure that the correct panel was done. Sometimes there are small panels that may miss important genes simply because they’re not part of the panel. So the test may be negative for everything that was assayed, but it may not rule out some of these rare mutations. Like Janet was saying, her mutation wasn’t even known about at that time she had the first testing done so she had to have repeat testing. And this is a very common story. So that’s what I wanted to say about testing.
But immune therapy is–really been a game changer in cancer in general including lung cancer, but this is the idea of trying to get someone’s own immune system so attack the cancer. Our bodies are supposed to do this. Our immune system is supposed to be on surveillance for cancer cells, treat them as foreign and destroy them, but obviously if a tumor grows to a point where you’re getting a diagnosis of cancer something has gone wrong in that process. Usually it is that that tumor is camouflaging itself in some way from the immune surveillance, and some of the new treatments that have been approved over the last couple of years in multiple types of cancer essentially rip off that camouflage, allow the immune system to see that the cancer is there as a foreign invader and start to attack it. In lung cancer this works best on the, as Janet was mentioning, the type of cancers that don’t have a driver mutation, the types of cancers that are more often associated with a history of smoking or exposure to some other carcinogens, and immune therapy has really changed the survival and the treatment options for a large population of lung cancer patients.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
And I just want to reiterate that it’s very important that you get genomic testing before you start immunotherapy because the data we have now indicates that immunotherapy usually does not work for those of us who have driving mutations.
Dr. Sequist:
And it may increase the toxicity of some of the targeted drugs, so not only may it not work but it might harm your chances of having a nice, long response like Janet and Marisa are having.
Andrew Schorr:
Hmm. This is complicated stuff. We talked about how difficult it is for the community oncologist who sees sort of all comers to keep up with this. Let’s just review some of the things that have come up recently at medical meetings that you’ve been at.
So first of all, Janet, from your perspective as a patient, you go to the World Lung meeting, you go to some of the other meetings, what do you think are the big deals for patients? Is it more genes being identified? Is it having immunotherapy work for more people? What are the big take-home messages we should review for people here?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
Well, you touched on two of them. One, there are more genes identified. I’m not sure I’ve got quite the right percentage, but at the moment I believe it’s about 70 percent of patients with non-small cell lung cancer have a driving mutation for which there’s an approved drug or a clinical trial. Is that right, Dr. Sequist? About?
Dr. Sequist:
I don’t know the exact number, but it’s got to be close to there.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
And then there’s immunotherapy, which not only works for some people who didn’t have treatment choices but in some cases continues to work after they stop taking the drug for a good period of time.
But I think one of the other big notes is it appears that immunotherapy may be working for small-cell lung cancer, which has not had a new treatment option in decades, so that is huge.
However, in addition to treatments I would say the next big thing, and it’s not too surprising I’m going to say this because this is what I talked at World Lung, but the fact that we have new patient groups forming around these driving oncogenes, we have enough patients who have been taking these targeted therapies enough, long enough and feeling good enough that they’re becoming active as advocates.
And they want to learn more about their disease, so we now have a group for ROS1 called the ROS1ders, for EGFR, EGFR resisters, for ALK, called ALK Positive, or RET, called the RET Renegades, and a separate group for a subset called Exon 20 group for insertions or Exon 20 of HER2 and EGFR.
And these patients groups are providing guidance to help patients find clinical trials, to help them understand their treatment, to deal with their side effects, to find experts, and we’re also funding research. So there are new research studies being funded by these patients, and the ROS1ders have actually created a study where we are making cancer models of our own rare cancer because researchers didn’t have anything to study, and now they have more cells. In fact, we’ve got, I think, four new cell lines in the past year and more in development.
And we also have three patients who have donated to creating mouse models of ROS1, and they hopefully will be useful for us. And they’ve already had two different publications on the subject. And without it some of the ROS1 research couldn’t be done, so we’re very excited about that.
Andrew Schorr:
Wow, just congratulations to all of you who are involved in this, and I know you’ve got a big smile on your face, Dr. Sequist. We used to have such a very short turn for most people with advanced lung cancer, and now, thank god, with research you’ve done and your peers around the world and in collaboration with patients we have people living much longer, like Marisa, who unfortunately couldn’t be with us today, but Janet and some others who are probably watching.
So that then gives you the opportunity to try to understand them and a lot of aspects of their care and their biology more than you ever could because people are living, right? So that chance for dialogue is really critical to understand how are we not just, yay, we have the medicines helping people live longer but what’s going on, right?
Dr. Sequist:
Yeah. I think that’s right, and it gives us an opportunity to think more critically about how we can do things differently, whereas 10, 15 years ago we were just trying it to find a way to help people live beyond a year. That was the glass ceiling that we were trying to break. And now that we’ve come so far in lung cancer we can really start looking at some of these important questions about sequencing medications, combining medications. What does that do to quality of life? What are other things that affect patients being on clinical trials for years and years, having to go through the scans and the tests? Trying to make clinical trial more accessible to people because of eligibility criteria that are obsolete.
So these are some of the lessons I’ve learned from working with patients in various forums, and it’s really very satisfying for me for sure.
Andrew Schorr:
I know a lot of your work is in EGFR, and if I have it right maybe the incidence of, if that’s the right term, of EGFR, let’s say in the Asian community is higher. Is that right? And so I know the percentage of people in clinical trials is low, like 3 percent. We need more participation of people from different groups so that you can understand how these different mutations are active more or less in different groups, right, and how certain medicines come into play? That’s one of the collaborations we from all groups need to do with you, right?
Dr. Sequist:
Well, I think another–that’s absolutely right, and another really important role that patient advocates can play is to educate their peers about what clinical research involves. Many people in this country are just scared about clinical research. They don’t want to be considered as a lab rat, and they think that’s something maybe for at the very end of the line when you’ve exhausted all other options when in fact some of the most promising clinical trials these days are for the very first treatment that you may take as soon as you’re diagnosed. And having people be aware that clinical trials are not just a way to experiment on a patient but to really offer the patient cutting-edge treatment that they couldn’t get outside of a trial and work together to bring new treatments to approval, that message is critical to get out to the public.
Andrew Schorr:
Right. And can accelerate medicines getting to the goal line quicker, right? I mean, Janet, I know you–a lot of what, for the community living with lung cancer, like you don’t know how long your ROS1 medicine will work.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
That’s right. It won’t last forever. I will eventually have to try something else, and the drug that I take will probably be in a clinical trial. I think it’s important to know that especially for those of us with driving oncogenes but also for people with cancers that don’t have a good effective treatment option, clinical trials may be your best treatment option. Clinical trials provide hope. There’s no guarantee that they will work, but when you don’t have any other option that looks effective or that lasts a long time clinical trials can be very useful.
Andrew Schorr:
So, Jess, a lot of times a physician will say to a patient, well, I might have a clinical trial for you and the patient comes home to review a whole stack of (?) legalist documents to try and simple–and the family member says, oh, no. What would you say to family members too about this idea of clinical trials and supporting your loved one in maybe getting tomorrow’s medicine today?
Jessica Wittebort:
I think it’s really important again to find a group of people that are on a clinical trial so you can see how real it is, how okay it is, you know, sort beat down those major misunderstandings, you know. Fears that you’re going to be given a placebo and then you’re left to go or whatever the case is. I think we’re still getting in a place where (?) ct.gov or Cancer Commons are able to really very clearly articulate it. The research is there, the information is there, but I do find it still a bit daunting for people who probably are just freshly diagnosed to understand what it means, so I think–
Andrew Schorr:
Right. As Janet said, there are people who can help you with the lung cancer groups she’s rattled by, online groups. There are all sorts of people who can help you, so I want you to–I hope our viewers will take advantage of that.
So, Dr. Sequist, people–Jess just mentioned about people have this fear of getting a placebo. If you’re in a trial, people want to get the good stuff even though you’re not sure what the good stuff is or how good the good stuff could be, but are they taken care of no matter what?
Dr. Sequist:
Patients are absolutely taken care of no matter what. There are many different kinds of clinical trials. Some of them have one arm where everyone on the trial gets the same treatment. Some of them may have multiple arms, and there could be a randomization where a computer basically rolls the dice and tells you and your doctor which arm you’re going to be placed in and you don’t have a choice. But patients are informed about the design of the trial and the various treatments before they sign up. We’re still–scientifically, before something can become standard of care, we still need to compare it to the old standard of care. Luckily, in lung cancer there really aren’t too many spaces left where standard of care would be placebo, so most patients getting lung cancer clinical trials are treated with a standard chemotherapy or a standard targeted therapy or a standard immune therapy, and then the experimental arm might be a variation on that or something totally different.
But it’s really important, and if you do participate in a clinical trial the person who is talking to you about the participation and getting your consent will inform you of all those things. What are the options? What could you be treated with? What is the purpose of the trial? How will it help you as a participant? These are all really important things to understand before you jump in.
Andrew Schorr:
Here’s a question–oh, sorry. Please.
Jessica Wittebort:
I was just going to say that Marisa just signed a stack of papers in Boston this week for participating in the blood biopsy trial, and that’s maybe the fourth pile of paperwork I’ve seen her sign. And it was an incredible process of just her being able to ask any questions, the nurse practitioner sitting down with her answering, answering everything and anything and understanding what it meant. And, you know, it’s–I just think we probably need to figure out how to eliminate some of the fear and the mystery around that process.
Andrew Schorr:
We did a program the other day and the replay will be posted soon with Dr. Richard Schilsky who is the chief medical officer of ASCO, the big cancer organization, and they’re really working hard with industry and government to simplify the forms. And, for instance, for people where English is not their first language to make sure that things are explained to you in your language, whether you read or if there’s a translator there so that you fully understand.
Here’s a question we got in from Ed, Dr. Sequist. He says, I’ve been an active participant in a Phase 1 trial for nearly three years. What is the average length of time it takes for a clinical trial to get to FDA approval?
Dr. Sequist:
That can really vary. I don’t think there is a standard answer, but a lot of people ask me, okay, doc, I’m going on to this Phase 1 trial at what paint will I be graduated up to Phase 2 or Phase 3? And, you know, patients usually don’t switch from a Phase 1 trial to a Phase 2 or 3. The drug development may continue and–continue on its pathway towards FDA development, but patients usually stay in the same trial that they started on.
The record time in oncology for first patient dosed–interval between first patient dosed in a Phase 1 trial to FDA approval was probably for crizotinib, which is an ALK, ROS and MET inhibitor, where the time was, what, about three years, Janet?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
Inaudible.
Dr. Sequist:
But most drugs take a little longer than that. But when I was training the–what I was taught was that it usually takes 10 years for a drug to get from Phase 1 to approval. Thankfully, that is not the case anymore. Most drugs are getting there in three, four, five years.
Andrew Schorr:
Well, I think, as Dr. Schilsky said the other day, they’re really trying to work with the FDA, the NCI, industry to try to do it, but part of it–now, for instance, the government is looking for patient-reported outcomes. How do things affect the patient in their life? So again doesn’t that come into play, too, Janet, that we need to be–we need to be not just part of the trial but we need to be giving information to help with as decisions are made about whether a new drug is a big deal, right?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
Yeah. Patient-reported outcomes are just starting to be incorporated into clinical trials, and it will be great to have them more involved and for patients to be able to provide inputs that are important to them about how they feel on the drug and how it affects them so that we will have more information about side effects when a drug gets approved. But it’s still fairly early.
But I want to go back to one thing that Dr. Sequist said, that the FDA is trying to put programs in place that will help get drugs approved faster. So the clinical trial that I’m on has been going for seven years and will keep going even though the drug is already approved because the drug was approved under what they call accelerated approval based on a Phase 1, 2 trial. Usually the FDA used to require that you had to have a big Phase 3 trial with hundreds of people where you compare the drug against the current standard of care and get a positive result before you could get the drug approved.
But now they’re making drugs for small populations like ROS1 patients. We’re 1 percent of the non-small cell lung cancer population, and you’ll never get enough of us together in one place to do a Phase 3 trial. So the FDA has something in place that allows you to approve drugs based on the Phase 2 trial. Everybody in this Phase 2 trial knows they are taking crizotinib. There is no placebo. So there are–the clinical trials are evolving.
Andrew Schorr:
So, Dr. Sequist, let’s back up for a second. So we’ve had–we have these meetings that you all go to, World Lung meeting, which was in Toronto I think a few months ago. And you have the ASCO meeting and others you probably go to around the world. What do you think is a big deal now? And I know I’ve seen you on the podium at some of these meetings. What do you think is a big deal for patients if you take away from some of the key studies that have been–you’re releasing data on?
Dr. Sequist:
It’s been a huge year for lung cancer. I mean, the standard of care has changed in lung cancer in almost every little corner that you look in. A year ago or certainly two years ago most patients who were diagnosed would get chemotherapy as the first pass treatment. If you happened to have one of the driver mutations then you would try and get one of those treatments first.
Now the standard of care has completely changed. Most patients get immune therapy with or without chemotherapy. There are new approved drugs for ALK and for EGFR in the frontline setting. There’s a new standard of care for stage III lung cancer which we haven’t had in 30 years. There’s a new standard of care for small-cell lung cancer which we haven’t had in 30 years. There’s more evidence from this past year about screening for lung cancer with low-dose CT scans and how this is really effective at diagnosing people earlier and saving lives, potentially especially so in women, we learned at World Lung. So every corner of lung cancer that you can shine a light into there’s been advancements over the last one to two years. It’s really quite amazing.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
We’ve also had one liquid biopsy approved where they can use a blood test to determine whether you’re eligible to take a certain kind of drug. That just happened last year I think.
Andrew Schorr:
So, Jess, you listen to this as a family member. What hope do you take away from that for your sister? Jess, could you hear me okay?
Jessica Wittebort:
Yes, sorry. You’re breaking up a little bit, Andrew.
Andrew Schorr:
I said you hear what Janet and Dr. Sequist were just saying. What hope can you take away from this because you worry about your sister of the week?
Jessica Wittebort:
Every single day I worry about her. And she has to worry about me as well. I often wonder who the real carer is. But, frankly, it’s, you know, she was given a brutal diagnosis three years ago, and she’s kicking. You know what I mean? She’s kicking. She’s doing great. She’s doing yoga teacher training. You know, she has good days and bad days, and I just think there’s an incredible amount of hope.
So get your head in the game, get some information. Get yourself a plan, and you move forward. And if you don’t find the doctor, and it happens all the time, can’t find the doctor you can trust or you can get the right answers from, then you keep looking.
Andrew Schorr:
So here’s some questions that we’ve got in. And, again, if our viewers have a question just send it to questions@patientpower.info.
Kevin writes in for you, Dr. Sequist, for many cancer patients there’s a learning curve. What are your thoughts on how a patient might know when they’re ready to learn and what are the first-stop resources that might give them education they’re ready for? And, Janet, I’m sure you’re going to weigh in. How about the ready to learn? Because otherwise at the beginning you’re drinking–you’re terrified, and you’re drinking from a fire hose?
Dr. Sequist:
Yeah, that’s a great question and I don’t think it’s one-size-fits-all. I mean, patients, it’s like all of us. They come with much different preferences about how they like to learn, about what they want to know, about whether they want to be the primary person learning things or they’re going to designate a family member to help them with this information.
Some people like to learn on the internet. That can be tricky because there’s a lot of bad information on the internet in addition to a lot of good information on the internet. Some people aren’t that into the internet, and they need to learn in-person or through meeting people or phone calls. Luckily, the lung cancer community has so many support systems and education systems that are out there.
Janet mentioned a few, LUNGevity and the American Cancer Society has some information on their website, but a lot of academic medical centers also have information on their websites about lung cancer and resources to connect you to learning more when you’re ready.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
So just to add to that, because there are a lot of wonderful, very educational resources on the internet the Lung Cancer Social Media group put together a reference page for vetted online resources. So if you go to lcsmchat.org under resources and look for what’s there you can find a list that includes links under various categories like for those who are newly diagnosed or looking at lung cancer screening or whatever. And on that list we’ve tried to pull a sample from all of the various pages we know of, all the various organizations that have good lung cancer information. So you can start there.
Andrew Schorr:
Dr. Sequist, I wanted to call out small-cell lung cancer, which I know is the minority of lung cancer. And Janet referred to immunotherapy there, and you talk about overall about hope. Where are we with small-cell now?
Dr. Sequist:
Well, there was a very exciting presentation in Toronto at the World Lung meeting and it got published in the premier journal, The New England Journal of Medicine, that same day that set a new standard for small-cell lung cancer, something that–it was actually really moving. The whole audience burst into applause and cheered essentially when this result came up because for most of us in the audience we had never witnessed an advance in small-cell lung cancer in the course of our career. So this advance is taking the standard chemotherapy for small-cell and adding immunotherapy to it, and patients had an improved survival when that happened.
Andrew Schorr:
Okay. So where do we go from here? Janet, you’re living with it. You wonder how long your medicine is going to work. You have one rare subtype. Other subtypes are being identified and then other people
where it hasn’t been identified yet. What do you want to say to people as far as just keeping on keeping on, if you will, and the importance of a dialogue with a doctor, a researcher in partnership?
Janet Freeman-Daily:
I think the only thing I would make sure everyone does, no matter whether you want to know all the details, whether you want to be involved in research is that it’s essential that you tell the doctor what is important to you. They can do all the rest of it if you need them to, but they can’t know whether it’s more important to you to try every last treatment no matter how lousy you feel, or whether you would rather make sure that if you can’t get out and walk in the woods then life isn’t worth living. They won’t know if you don’t tell them, so it’s important for you as a patient to start thinking about what matters to you in terms of your treatment.
Likely, you’ll be on more than one treatment at some point if you have metastatic lung cancer, and you need to know whether the side effects are acceptable to you. So even if you don’t want to do the research at least be able to tell the doctor what matters to you. I hope Dr. Sequist that you get some patients who do that.
Andrew Schorr:
So, Jess, so some people have trouble speaking up for themselves. I don’t think you’re sister is that way, but you go with her to a lot of treatments and visits. What would you say to family members to support their loved one, and if their loved one isn’t, isn’t feeling strong enough to speak up that the family member has permission to do that and that it makes a difference.
Jessica Wittebort:
Yeah, I think Marisa has her boyfriend, my dad, (?) Inaudible happy to hem and holler about the questions we have and the questions that she raised since the last time we saw the oncologist. But more recently she referred to us as the peanut gallery. I think she’s, you know, at the beginning of this diagnosis I was the one that reached out to the ROS1 group, and now she has a pleural effusion and she’s trying to figure out all the places that that pleural fluid should go to support research.
So I think that the journey will change. I hate that word, journey. I think the path changes as you go. You know that old when you come to a fork in the road, you can take the path or whatever it is, and I think you just have to figure out how to be flexible and flex with that journey. There was–one of the really nice pieces at the Biden Cancer Initiative, I’m terrible with names, the athlete was talking about, you know, everybody talks about diagnosis and the shoot for the cure, but it’s that middle, it’s that middle part that is so tenuous and you have to get really comfortable with the uncomfortable middle part.
So I think, gosh, it could be a strain and stress on your loved ones, and I think the communication is just one must of the exercise as you go, and if you can figure out how to lean into that as a carer, as a patient, as a loved one, then you’re probably ahead of the curve.
Andrew Schorr:
Thank you for that, and we wish your sister all the best, Marisa. My last question is for Janet and then Dr. Sequist. So it used to be the doctor was in the white coat, and the doctor said we’re going to do this, and you were scared, and you went down the hall to have a scan or this or a biopsy, whatever, you just did it. You’re just sort of literally the walking wounded, and you and your family were terrified. And whether you understood or not you sort of nodded your head, and that’s what would happen.
Dr. Sequist, do you welcome the change? Do you welcome the change that we’re sort of all in this
together? And I don’t mean just physicians but I mean researchers too, that this feeling that the patients, the family members, that together, we can solve things. Alone, it’s slower or more difficult?
Dr. Sequist:
Oh, yeah. It’s a very welcome change. I’ve gotten a lot of information and education as well as satisfaction from participating in the lung cancer social media group that Janet mentioned. It’s really great to be able to connect with people on Twitter who are researching lung cancer around the world or who are patients living with lung cancer around the world. And it’s a way to get lightning-fast updates about conferences, and everybody working together towards a common goal is a good feeling to be in that pack.
And I would say to patients out there if you’re in a relationship with a provider where it feels more like what you were describing, Andrew, like that you’re just being told what to do and you’re not being listened to or you don’t have the ability to speak up or have your loved one speak up for you, you need to seek out a different oncologist. Because it’s too important.
It’s too important of a disease to be dealing with someone you don’t have a great relationship with. And I would define a great cancer patient/oncologist relationship is one where both people can feel free for express what’s on their mind and to listen to each other and just feel heard and feel part of the decision-making.
Andrew Schorr:
I just think has a tragedy if, as you say, the landscape is changing so much–we have a long way to go, but it is changing so much in welcome. What a shame if you or your loved one passes away because there wasn’t a certain test done or a wide enough panel testing and there was something either approved or in trials that could make a difference to extend life. What a tragedy.
So Janet, I’m going to leave the last sort of empowerment message to you, what you want to say to people so that that doesn’t happen.
Janet Freeman-Daily:
I think there’s been a lot of good comments in the entire presentation along those lines. I think there’s a lot of evidence to show that engaged patients with serious diseases live longer. That patients who become more educated about their disease when it’s on the cutting edge as lung cancer is right now, they have a much better chance of making sure that they’re getting the best care.
But I also want to point out one interesting thing that’s evolving as we get these more empowered patient groups. We actually had a doctor, a researcher approach us because he had heard that ROS1 patients supposedly didn’t have as many brain mets as outpatients did, and that didn’t seem right to him. So we actually worked with him and did a survey on our own patient group and were able to tell him, yeah, it’s a lot more common than people are giving it credit for, which stimulated a whole new path of research that’s changing the way that people think about the disease. And if we had not had that open communication between the patients and the researchers, if we hadn’t had the empowered patient groups that survey wouldn’t have happened. So I think this change in paradigm being patients learning about their disease and getting involved in patient groups is making a huge difference.
Andrew Schorr:
Well, Janet Freeman-Daily thank you for being with us once again. I hope we get to do this for years and years, Janet, and one day we can say cured. Wouldn’t that be great? And I’m so delighted to see you and for joining us.
And Jess Wittebort, thanks so much for being with us too. All the best to your sister Marisa with the procedures she has, and, as you say, she’s kicking it, and I hope that keeps happening.
And Dr. Lecia Sequist from Mass General, thank you for your devotion to patients and helping lead the way in research so that we can really everybody can get the personalized care they need.
I’m Andrew Schorr from Patient Power. Remember, knowledge can be the best medicine of all.
Please remember the opinions expressed on Patient Empowerment Network (PEN) are not necessarily the views of our sponsors, contributors, partners or PEN. Our discussions are not a substitute for seeking medical advice or care from your own doctor. That’s how you’ll get care that’s most appropriate for you.
https://powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/innovate.png600600Kara Rayburnhttps://www.powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/New-Logo-300x126.pngKara Rayburn2018-12-04 19:48:312021-06-25 08:50:45How Can Lung Cancer Patients Stay Involved in Research to Innovate New Treatments?
As lung cancer research efforts continue to gain steam, results of trial studies are presented at major medical meetings like WCLC, ASCO and major initiatives like the Biden Cancer Summit are dedicated to marshaling resources across the federal government to help lead to improved cancer prevention. Will patients attending these meetings drive research and innovate new treatments? Does attending have a positive impact or make the conversations more difficult?
Noted lung cancer expert, Dr. Lecia Sequist joins this program to provide an expert perspective on the impact of patient involvement in her research and how both lung cancer patients and care partners can contribute to bringing new medicines to the market.
Dr. Sequist will be joined by Marisa Wittebort, a lung cancer advocate with a very rare mutation, ROS1. Hear Marisa’s story of her journey with lung cancer and how her recent attendance to the Biden Summit impacted her. Register now to join us LIVE online Monday, November 5, 2018 for a 1-hour webinar beginning at 1:00 PM Pacific (3:00 PM Central; 4:00 PM Eastern)
Join us to learn:
How can lung cancer patients stay involved in moving research forward?
Are there new treatments available now and possibly in the near future directly driven by patient involvement?
What impact do patients attending medical meetings have on studies?
A debrief on global lung cancer meetings and whether you should attend
Join us LIVE online Monday, November 5, 2018at 1:00 PM Pacific. Send your questions to: lung@patientpower.info.
Guests:
https://powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/Screen-Shot-2018-10-24-at-12.10.35-PM.png357637Kara Rayburnhttps://www.powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/New-Logo-300x126.pngKara Rayburn2018-11-05 16:00:002018-11-05 21:30:00How Can Lung Cancer Patients Stay Involved in Research to Innovate New Treatments?
Lung cancer research is moving at such a rapid pace with the understanding that on a molecular level, lung cancer is not just one disease, but many. As a result, patients and care partners often struggle to make sense of the latest research in this era of precision medicine. What are the markers being looked at in lung cancer, and what do they reveal about predictors of treatment? What research strides are being made for Small Cell Lung Cancer (SCLC) patients? How can patients get involved now to move science ahead?
In this webinar in partnership with H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute, Dr. Jhanelle Gray, a medical oncologist and Dr. Theresa Boyle a molecular pathologist will discuss the latest understanding of lung cancer research; currently approved therapies and promising clinical trials. The goal of this program is to help patients, care partners be better informed and play a more active role in care. Join us to learn:
Agenda
2:30 – 2:35 PM
Welcome and Introductions: Meet the Panel
2:35 – 2:55 PM
Updates on Genomics in Lung Cancer
2:55 – 3:15 PM
The Critical Role of a Pathologist
3:15 – 4:00 PM
Q&A – Ask the Lung Cancer Expert
Register to join us Thursday, November 8 @ 11:30am Pacific/2:30pm Eastern.Patients will have an opportunity to ask questions of the panel in advance, just send them to lung@patientpower.info.
https://powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/Screen-Shot-2018-10-03-at-5.35.59-PM.png354637Kara Rayburnhttps://www.powerfulpatients.org/pen/wp-content/uploads/New-Logo-300x126.pngKara Rayburn2018-11-08 14:30:002018-10-03 21:43:26Q&A Webinar: How Do We Increase Precision Medicine’s Reach in Lung Cancer?
