A Fascinating Discussion: Bringing Expert Clinical Interpretation to Complex Tumor Cell Genomics

As a cancer survivor and an active advocate, I typically attend several cancer research symposia, conferences, and workshops every year.  But one of my favorite meetings is always the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO)’s Annual Meeting, since it brings together tens of thousands of oncology clinicians, researchers, advocates, and other oncology professionals from around the world, where attendees learn from leading-edge scientific and educational sessions, clinical science symposia, oral abstracts, poster discussions, and plenary sessions.

During this year’s Annual ASCO Meeting in  Chicago, I decided to attend a half-day “pre-meeting session” on a topic that is particularly timely for every cancer patient, researcher, oncology clinician, advocate, and all other stakeholders involved in and impacted by our current genomic revolution in cancer.  Called Genetics and Genomics for the Practicing Clinician, the session included several expert panelists whom discussed cancer genetics and tumor genomics specifically for clinicians who work directly with cancer patients.  While discussing tumor (somatic) and inherited (germline) mutations and the tools and tests available to oncology clinicians, the panelists used case-based presentations and a multidisciplinary tumor board format to highlight crucial clinical considerations and to connect the panels’ content to real-world scenarios to help ensure that participants may apply what they learned to their daily clinical practice for the benefit of their cancer patients and family members.

This pre-meeting session was absolutely worth the price of my entire trip to ASCO this year.  Yet what I remember most is actually a question that was posed by a gentleman in the audience toward the end of the session.  As he directed his question to all the panelists, he made the following provocative statement: “I would argue that evidence-based medicine is incompatible with precision medicine and, as currently practiced, is not effective for cancer care.”  If you have read my blog in the past, you know that its tag line is “It’s all about the evidence,” so it may be of no surprise to you that I was intrigued by the gentleman’s statement.  At the session’s close, I introduced myself to him, explained my role as a cancer research advocate and blogger, and asked whether he would be willing to be interviewed concerning his perspective on precision medicine versus evidence-based medicine and, as it quickly emerged, his role as a classically trained human geneticist and molecular pathologist.  To my pleasure, he readily agreed.  For those of you who are cancer survivors, advocates, oncology clinicians, and any other stakeholder type affected by cancer (essentially everyone), I have no doubt that you’ll find this discussion fascinating, as it essentially serves as a primer for those interested in the genomic interpretation of tumor and inherited mutations in cancer and the many considerations and implications regarding such interpretation.

Without further ado, I’d like to introduce you to Gabriel Bien-Willner, MD, PhD, FCAP.

 

Board certified in Anatomic Pathology and Molecular Genetic Pathology, Gabe has deep expertise in next-generation sequencing (NGS) and a long history of providing critical insight into the molecular basis of disease in cancer patients.  You can click here to read our interview, published by the American Journal of Managed Care on my AJMC contributor’s page.  Or you can also read our complete interview here as a PDF by simply clicking on the link below:

Interview-with-Dr-Gabriel-Bien-Willner

I’d also like to take this opportunity to again thank Gabe for our truly fascinating and informative discussion and for his crucial ongoing efforts on behalf of all of us who have been, are, or will some day be affected by cancer personally.

 

Immunotherapy Part II: Understanding the Unique Spectrum of Adverse Events

In last week’s blog, entitled “Cancer Immunotherapy: a Patient’s Perspective,” I discussed the increasing excitement concerning new immunotherapies for patients with advanced and difficult-to-treat cancers, the need for caution in interpreting results while the data is still young, and the necessity for more mature data with much longer follow-up on an increased number of patients.

Part II of this blog series, now posted on The American Journal of Managed Care’s Contributors Page, continues on this important topic, focusing on why it is so critical for patients and their caregivers to understand the unique spectrum of adverse events that may be associated with these agents.  Unfortunately–and unsurprisingly–when reporting on the potential benefits of immunotherapy, some in the popular media have stated that there are “few to no side effects” associated with such therapies.  Though immunotherapies are typically not associated with the same adverse effects seen with chemotherapy regimens, “The Promise of Cancer Immunotherapy: Why Patient Education is Critical, Part II” outlines why the statement “few to no side effects” does not tell the entire story and may be extremely misleading for patients–and emphasizes the information that must be shared with patients before beginning any immunotherapy treatment.

 

Cancer Immunotherapy: a Patient Advocate’s Perspective

Over the last few years, months, and weeks, we have seen an increasing number of headlines pronouncing immunotherapy as the most exciting development in cancer treatment in recent memory.  Yet what is striking to many is that these discussions are not solely taking place throughout the popular media.  Rather, immunotherapy is more and more frequently becoming a major topic among oncologists, investigators, government agencies, academia, patient advocates, industry, and other stakeholders–where some express genuine excitement and others weigh in with cautious optimism concerning its potential promise.

Yet despite the optimism, the field is still very much in its infancy, and the evidence is still emerging.  As a cancer research advocate, a key part of my role is focusing on the state of the evidence and the implications for patients, ensuring that scientific information is presented clearly and realistically, and raising the need for caution in increasing the hopes of patients when such data is still “in early days.”  In other words, because the encouraging results for some patients with previously resistant disease have been widely heralded in the popular media and since immunotherapy is in fact an increasingly active area of research, it is critical that cancer patients and their loved ones truly know what to expect from immunotherapy.

So when I was recently asked to contribute a new article for the American Journal of Managed Care and Evidence-Based Oncology  from the perspective of a patient and cancer research advocate, it was immediately clear that the following would be my next topic: “The Promise of Cancer Immunotherapy: Why Patient Education is Critical.”  So please click here to read this most recent contribution, and consider sharing it with other patients, advocates, caregivers, and healthcare providers concerning the current realities of cancer immunotherapy, the remaining questions, and why long-term follow-up and continued research is so critical with a much larger number of patients to obtain the mature data needed regarding safety, efficacy, potential adverse effects, durability of beneficial response, and impact on patients’ overall survival.