Robert S. Miller, MD, FACP, FASCO, Assistant Professor of Oncology and Oncology Medical Information Officer at the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins, has been named Medical Director of the Institute for Quality (iQ) of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). Dr....
INSIDE THE BLACK BOX is an occasional column providing insight into the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and its policies and procedures. In this installment, FDA oncologists Gideon Blumenthal, MD, and Tatiana Prowell, MD, discuss 10 common myths about FDA’s Office of Hematology and Oncology ...
Susan T. Mayne, PhD, C-EA, Winslow Professor of Epidemiology; Associate Director for Population Sciences at Yale Cancer Center; and Chair of the Department of Chronic Disease Epidemiology at Yale School of Public Health, has been appointed to the position of Center Director of the Center for Food...
When Thomas Alva Edison, the Wizard of Menlo Park, heard of Roentgen’s discovery of the x-ray, he directed his research staff to create x-ray tubes and better screens on which to view the images. Edison owned America’s first industrial research laboratory and could easily supply the know-how,...
In November, the American Society of Hematology (ASH) announced the names of seven recipients of its Bridge Grant awards. These 1-year, $150,000 awards provide critical interim support for hematology research proposals that, despite earning high scores, could not be funded by the National...
On December 3, 2014, Robert S. Miller, MD, FACP, FASCO, will start his new position as Medical Director of ASCO’s Institute for Quality (iQ). Established in 2012 to oversee the development of clinical practice guidelines, the Quality Oncology Practice Initiative (QOPI), the QOPI Certification...
The Harvard Global Equity Initiative is a research program at Harvard University that is dedicated to promoting equitable global development, with a strong emphasis on health-care issues. This initiative brings together scholars, policymakers, advocates, and practitioners from around the world to...
The American Society of Hematology (ASH) recently announced the 20 hematologists and other medical professionals selected to participate in the 2014 ASH Visitor Training Program. This program provides talented hematologists, scientists, and laboratory staff from developing countries the opportunity ...
Palliative care expert Diane E. Meier, MD, is the Director of the Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC), a national organization devoted to enhancing the number and quality of palliative care programs across the nation. Under her leadership, the number of palliative care programs in the United...
“I learned a lot of things in medical school, but mortality wasn’t one of them,” writes Atul Gawande, MD, MPH, in his new book on the medicalization of aging and dying, Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End (Metropolitan Books, 2014). In the book, Dr. Gawande critiques the American...
Daniel F. Hayes, MD, FASCO, has been elected President of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) for the term beginning in June 2016. He will take office as President-Elect during the ASCO Annual Meeting in Chicago in June 2015. “I’m honored to be elected incoming president of ASCO, which ...
Roswell Park Cancer Institute (RPCI) has named Victor Filadora, MD, MBA, as Chief of Clinical Services. In this new role, Dr. Filadora, an anesthesiologist first appointed to the Institute’s medical staff in 2003, is responsible for managing the comprehensive cancer center’s Ambulatory Services,...
Gary Levine, MD, a breast radiologist, is joining MemorialCare Health System as Medical Director of MemorialCare Breast Centers in Orange and Los Angeles counties. Dr. Levine, President of the National Consortium of Breast Centers, will partner with physician leadership teams at MemorialCare...
INSIDE THE BLACK BOX is an occasional column providing insight into the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and its policies and procedures. In this installment, FDA oncologists Gideon Blumenthal, MD, and Tatiana Prowell, MD, discuss 10 common myths about FDA’s Office of Hematology and Oncology ...
The American Association of Clinical Chemistry (AACC) has announced that Loretta L. Doan, PhD, has assumed the position of Vice President of Policy and Global Affairs. Prior to joining AACC, Dr. Doan served as Director of Science Policy at the Endocrine Society, an organization representing more...
In an oncology health-care system that is increasingly changing its delivery and payment models, how do busy oncologists successfully bridge the transition from a volume- to value-based, patient-centric model? This, and other topics on value fueled a robust discussion at the Association of...
The American Society for Radiation Oncology’s (ASTRO) Board of Directors has announced three additions to the Society’s management team: Emily Wilson has been named Executive Vice President; Dave Adler has been promoted to Vice President of Advocacy; and Anne Hubbard has been promoted to Director...
Theodore S. Lawrence, MD, PhD, has been named Director of the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center. Dr. Lawrence succeeds Max S. Wicha, MD, who founded the Cancer Center 27 years ago. “This is a tremendous program, with talented and dedicated faculty and staff, a terrific research...
Each year in the United States, about 55,000 people will be diagnosed with head and neck cancer, and of them, about 12,000 will die of the disease. Although advances have been made in the treatment of head and neck cancer, this disease remains persistently problematic, due, in part, to the complex...
Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) launched the agency’s first mobile application (app) specifically designed to speed public access to valuable information about drug shortages. The app identifies current drug shortages, resolved shortages, and discontinuations of drug products....
A variety of studies, including one published this past year in the Journal of Clinical Oncology,1 have showed that clinicians who care for seriously ill patients are at high risk for diminished personal well-being, including high rates of burnout; moral distress, defined as the inability to act in ...
In 1913, 10 doctors and 5 laypersons in New York founded the American Cancer Society (ACS). At that time, a cancer diagnosis was almost always fatal and was rarely discussed in public. The Society’s original charter was to raise awareness about cancer, and although that mission has remained firm,...
The members of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) have elected five members to serve on the AACR board of directors for the 2015–2018 term and four members to serve on the nominating committee for the 2015–2017 term. They will begin their terms at the AACR Annual Meeting 2015, to...
“Older adults constitute the only increasing natural resource in the entire world.” —Linda Fried, PhD, Columbia School of Public Health The good and bad news about our changing demographic world is that the population of older adults is increasing in the United States and worldwide. While it is...
As the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) celebrates its 20th year, The ASCO Post asked its Chief Executive Officer, Robert W. Carlson, MD, to reflect on the organization’s accomplishments, mission, and future and on the role he may have played in its success. The Early Years You became...
Physicians are being “bombarded” with changes in health care and beyond, Richard R. Barakat, MD, FACS, noted in his Presidential Address at the Society of Gynecologic Oncology (SGO) Annual Meeting on Women’s Cancer. These changes are being precipitated by steeply rising health-care costs amid...
The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) and the Association of Community Cancer Centers (ACCC) responded to the approval of H.R.2, a Medicare-reform bill to end the program’s sustainable growth rate (SGR) formula. ASCO’s Statement ASCO President Peter Paul Yu, MD, FACP, FASCO, praised the ...
Stephen S. Grubbs, MD, a community oncologist and Managing Partner at Medical Oncology Hematology Consultants, PA, has been named the Senior Director of ASCO’s new Clinical Affairs Department. Dr. Grubbs is a longtime ASCO member and volunteer and the Principal Investigator of the Delaware...
Richard Pazdur, MD, was awarded the American Association of Cancer Research’s (AACR) Distinguished Public Service Award at the 2015 AACR Annual Meeting. The Association chose Dr. Pazdur for this award based on his “extraordinary, steadfast leadership in scientific and regulatory affairs” and his...
Roswell Park Cancer Institute recently announced a restructuring of its leadership. “In many cases, these new appointments represent Roswell Park Cancer Institute parlaying our own existing strengths and talents,” says President and CEO Candace Johnson, PhD. “Restructuring some of these positions...
An analysis of Gynecologic Oncology Group (GOG) studies recently reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Tewari and colleagues and reviewed in this issue of The ASCO Post showed a survival benefit of intraperitoneal chemotherapy vs intravenous chemotherapy over long-term follow-up in women...
As a regular readers of The ASCO Post know, ASCO is developing an exciting new health information learning system called CancerLinQ™, which will exponentially enlarge our understanding of cancer therapy far beyond what we’ve achieved with our system of clinical trials. Cancer clinical trials have...
The following new appointments were recently announced at Cleveland Clinic’s Taussig Cancer Institute. James Stevenson, MD Dr. Stevenson has been appointed Vice Chairman of the Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology. As Vice Chairman, Dr. Stevenson will assist the Chairman and Department...
Kevin Fitzpatrick has been named CEO of CancerLinQ LLC, a wholly owned nonprofit subsidiary of ASCO. Mr. Fitzpatrick, who is currently the Executive Vice President and Chief Innovation Officer of the American College of Cardiology (ACC), will begin his new role on August 3. CancerLinQ LLC was...
Charles M. Rubin, MD, Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Chicago Medicine, a highly respected specialist in the care of children with cancer, died on July 17. He was 62. An authority on all aspects of pediatric cancers, Dr. Rubin had a particular interest in brain tumors and...
The value proposition in health care is often represented with the following equation: Value = Outcomes/Cost. The simplicity of this equation, however, belies the complexity of its parts, which are the contributions of multiple stakeholders with unique perspectives. A session presented at the 2015...
Among the Conquer Cancer Foundation’s newest supporters, Ludwig Cancer Research is an international community of distinguished scientists dedicated to preventing and controlling cancer. Its emphasis on collaboration and long-term support has fostered its role as a leader in immunotherapy and other...
The National Cancer Institute (NCI) recently awarded Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) at the University of Utah and The UNM Cancer Center (UNMCC) at the University of New Mexico Comprehensive Cancer Center status. An NCI-Designated Comprehensive Cancer Center must demonstrate depth and breadth of...
St. Barnabas Hospital is located in the heart of Bronx, New York, and as such, it has a culturally diverse, largely poor, patient population. The backbone of successful palliative care services is the doctor-patient communication bonding process. However, many of the patients with late-stage cancer ...
Rural cancer patients have long had to adjust to difficult geographic and financial barriers to access high-quality cancer care. These problems are exacerbated by today’s fiscal challenges, which have disrupted many of the small community practices that once served rural communities. In 2006, the...
The statistics are staggering. Despite the development of novel analgesics and the increasing awareness of the importance of adequately controlling pain from cancer or its treatment, up to 50% of patients undergoing treatment and between 70% and 90% of patients with advanced disease experience some ...
ASCO has called on the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to reconsider revisions to payment policies that could be administratively burdensome to oncology practices and result in reimbursement that inadequately supports optimal cancer patient care. In a comment letter to CMS on...
According to the National Cancer Institute (NCI), about 70,000 adolescents and young adults—defined by the NCI as those in the 15- to 39-year-old range—are diagnosed with cancer each year in the United States, about six times the number of cases diagnosed in children aged 0 to 14.1 And, although...
Sandra L. Wong, MD, MS, the William W. Coon Professor of Surgical Oncology and Associate Chair of Clinical Affairs at the University of Michigan Health System, has been named Chair of Surgery at Dartmouth-Hitchcock and the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth and Senior Vice President of the...
City of Hope in Duarte, California, recently announced the following new appointments. Susanne G. Warner, MD Dr. Warner has been appointed Assistant Clinical Professor in the Department of Surgery. She received her medical degree from Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine, where...
The Mayo Clinic Board of Trustees named Bobbie Gostout, MD, Vice President of the Mayo Clinic. Dr. Gostout will be the physician leader for Mayo’s community practice in the Midwest, including Mayo Clinic Health System in Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin, and Mayo Clinic’s Minnesota-based community...
The ASCO Post is pleased to reproduce installments of the “Art of Oncology” as published previously in the Journal of Clinical Oncology (JCO). These articles focus on the experience of suffering from cancer or of caring for people diagnosed with cancer, and they include narratives, topical essays,...
The Los Angeles County Medical Association (LACMA) awarded the Hospital Physician Leadership Award to Alexandra M. Levine, MD, MACP, Chief Medical Officer of City of Hope. Dr. Levine received the award in recognition of her exemplary contributions to the medical profession, including her leadership ...
In 1990, when Bruce (B.J.) Miller, MD, was an undergraduate at Princeton University, the practice of medicine was far from his mind. Then a student in Chinese and Asian studies and later an art history major, Dr. Miller would come to pursue a career specializing in palliative medicine after an...
Mohamed Bentires-Alj, PharmD, PhD, was recognized with the 8th Annual American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Outstanding Investigator Award for Breast Cancer Research, funded by Susan G. Komen. He received the award at the 2015 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. The AACR Outstanding...