These cancer patients write their own story
They hurt. They weep. They fly. They soar above the thunderheads. They plunge back to earth. They hold fast to their lovers and their children. They bruise. They burn. They heal. Cancer is not a...
Category: health policy
Before the Senate, an Oregon cancer researcher defends international collaborations
“The United States represents only five percent of the world’s population and we draw the best minds from all of the world," said Joe Gray, Ph.D. "So, what we don’t want to do is diminish our...
New questions about the tradeoffs in ‘accelerated’ cancer drug studies
Cancer clinical trials that use less-reliable shortcut endpoints save relatively little time, according to an analysis of 107 cancer drugs approved for 188 indications from 2006 to 2017. Image:...
Cancer costs: Marketing and myth busting
More than half of cancer drugs approved in recent years may not be helping patients to live longer. Meanwhile, the average price of cancer drugs has been increasing by 10 percent annually for more...
Taking stock of the evidence for ‘off-label’ use of cancer drugs
Doctors often expand the use of cancer drugs to situations beyond those explicitly approved by the Food and Drug Administration. And health plans will pay for those uses as long as they are supported...
What magnitude of benefit is meaningful to cancer patients?
Oncologists often use the phrase "clinically meaningful benefit" to describe the effect of an experimental treatment. But is the benefit meaningful for patients? A new paper suggests that benefit...
Cancer translated’s top blog posts of 2017
From basic science to survivorship and patient advocacy, the OHSU Knight Cancer Institute’s 'Cancer translated' blog explores new ideas and debates in cancer medicine. We sorted a year’s worth...
Unmasking the cost of cancer drug development
Cancer drug R&D spending may be a fraction of the estimate cited by the biopharmaceutical industry. The average price of anticancer drugs has been rising by about 10 percent annually in...
When evidence contradicts entrenched medical practices
Medical reversal is the phenomenon when a medical practice falls out of favor not by being surpassed, but when researchers discover that it didn't really work all along. “I think the lesson of...
When cancer drug marketing sneaks into a soap opera plot
Polycythemia vera is an uncommon blood cancer that can be controlled with long-established treatments. So it seemed more than a little suspicious to Vinay Prasad, M.D., M.P.H., when the disease took...
Lessons from Oregon about end-of-life care
At the end of life, people in Oregon are more likely to have their care wishes honored, less likely to be hospitalized and more likely to use home hospice services compared with people in...