‘It is impossible to empower patients unless they can understand the information being given to them,’ said Ian Banks, Chair of the Cancer Patient Working Group, at a roundtable meeting at the European Cancer Congress in Amsterdam, hosted by Prof Gordon McVie from the European Institute of Oncology and Editor of ecancer.

Banks was backed up by the Chair of the EAPM Working Group for Research, Prof. Ulrik Ringborg, Karolinska Institute, who agreed that transmitting information was key to patients’ involvement in their own treatment.

The event, ‘Oncology/Haematology: How to provide the right prevention and treatment to the right patient at the right time’ saw more than a dozen speakers addressing the broader issues of personalised medicine in terms of oncology and haematology, while looking towards the EU’s Horizon 2020 initiative.

The roundtable was co-organised by EAPM and EurocanPlatform.

Prof. Ringborg added that medical research needs more outcomes, clinical analysis and proof of cost effectiveness. This was in response to assertions from Bengt Jonsson, Professor in Health Economics at the Stockholm School of Economics, who said that ‘more success stories with well-constructed evidence bases’ were required, especially in the current economy.

Prof. Jonsson added that the key success factor for personalised medicine is to provide evidence on the outcomes for the population -  health and quality of care. But this is not enough, he said: ‘Those who have the money to pay for personalised medicine, the healthcare payers, will also ask for evidence about cost-effectiveness.’ More success in that arena would lead to better access.

The roundtable, which also consisted of oncology and haematology experts from the Italian Ministry of Health, the University of Bologna, Genomic Health, the University of Nijmegen, EORTC, SIOPE, the European Society of Radiology, European Cancer Patient Coalition and Queens University, Belfast, had earlier heard Andreas Penk, Regional President of Pfizer’s Oncology Business Unit, take up a similar theme saying: ‘We need to demonstrate a cost-benefit ratio, especially when faced with the challenges that not every patient responds to treatment and overall survival rates can often not be demonstrated.’

Penk also underlined Pfizer’s work with the Innovative Medicines Initiative, known as IMI and IMI 2 - the  largest public-private initiative between the European Union and the pharmaceutical industry association EFPIA.

IMI 2, he said, builds on the success of IMI in a continued effort to bring innovative solutions to patients and is not limited to EFPIA members. It has an estimated budget of €3.45 billion and includes among its aims the delivery of a 30% better success rate in clinical trials of priority medicines and the addressing of the regulatory context to speed up translation from research to innovation.

Denis Lacombe, representing EORTC, pointed out that the clinical research lanscape ‘is heading for profound changes’. ‘There is an urgent need to reshape interactions between stakeholders,’ he said.

Theo de Witte, from the Department of Tumor Immunology in Nijmegen, made a strong point during the roundtable saying: ‘Instead of chronicising cancers, oncologists and haematologists need to focus on finding cures,’ while Prof. Gilles Vassal, of SIOPE, said that his organisation’s goals were exactly that. ‘We need to increase the cure rate in poor prognosis malignancies and to increase the quality of life in survivors,’ he told the meeting.

The attendees also heard from Steve Shak, MD, Research and Development at Genomic Heath, in the field of tests for certain genes or proteins found in breast cancer tumours.  Testing for the levels may give healthcare professionals an indication of how a tumour might develop, and he highlighted that NICE had given a positive recommendation regarding this recently.  An ESMO spokesman said: ‘What makes the MINDACT trial noteworthy is that it is the first prospective trial aimed at demonstrating that a significant proportion of breast cancer patients can spare chemotherapy without a detrimental effect on distant relapse-free survival, based on the genomic assessment of risk.’

As well as Ian Banks, patients were represented by Prof. Francesco de Lorenzo, president of the ECPC, and Belfast’s Prof. Mark Lawler, who gave his views on ethical considerations.

In his summing up of what had been a highly technical interactive session, Prof. Ringborg stated that among the key elements for progress in the field were more and better collaboration between stakeholders, including patient groups, and clinical effectiveness assessments linked to health economy.

Source: EAPM