Leading National Patient Group Urges Government Officials To Preserve Access To Erythropoiesis Stimulating Agents For Cancer Patients
"NPAF recognizes that there are real concerns about how ESA drugs are prescribed and how they are priced and marketed, and so we fully support the usage and pricing reviews that have been initiated in the Congress and elsewhere," said NPAF CEO Nancy Davenport-Ennis. "ESAs should only be used with caution, with appropriate targets of therapy, and with comprehensive response assessments. And if there are prescribing or pricing irregularities, they need to be uncovered and eliminated."
"At the same time, the patients we represent, and their physicians, know that ESA therapy is a very important adjunct to cancer therapy and supportive care that leads to a higher quality of life and independent living," Davenport-Ennis continued. "NPAF believes strongly that ESA therapies for cancer patients are critical to successful outcomes in many cases, and recent studies about danger to patients should be carefully evaluated for their applicability to the cancer population, particularly studies that focus on non-hematopoietic malignancies."
NPAF also expressed its objection to any arbitrary time limits placed upon ESA therapies, since individual patients respond very differently to treatment. Furthermore, any guidelines that put patients at the mercy of transfusions and blood availability are misguided, due to an increasingly stressed national blood supply, and impact on rural patients who may live hours from the nearest transfusion facility.
Anemia is common in cancer patients and may be directly caused by the cancer or may be a consequence of cancer treatments. ESA therapy available since 1989 has revolutionized cancer therapy by widely replacing blood transfusions as treatments for anemia, where the risks of disease transmission and iron overload are greater in transfusions.
In addition to CEO Davenport-Ennis, signatories of the letter include Dr. Dennis A. Gastineau, Director, Human Cell Therapy Lab, Mayo Clinic; Dr. Lori Williams, University of Texas, MD Anderson Cancer Center; Dr. Richard Theriault, Professor of Medicine, MD Anderson Cancer Center; Dr. Marc Stewart, Professor of Medicine, University of Washington Fred Hutchison Cancer Research Center; Dr. Bruce Avery, Director, Hematology-Oncology Knoxville; Dr. Don Conway, Director, The Healthcare Initiative, Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business; Dr. Robert M. Rifkin, Director, Cellular Therapeutics, Rocky Mountain Blood & Marrow Transplant Program, Rocky Mountain Cancer Centers; and Dr. David Brizel, Professor of Radiation Oncology, Associate Professor of Otolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery, Duke University Medical Center.
CEO Davenport-Ennis stressed that NPAF is one of many leaders in the patient and cancer care community which have expressed serious concerns about the CMS proposal, including the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), US Oncology, the American Society of Hematology (ASH), the Cancer Leadership Council, Friends of Cancer Research, and many others.
NPAF represents the voices and experiences of the patients served through its direct patient services organization -- the Patient Advocate Foundation -- which last year received over 6.4 million patient requests for information and assistance, and handled 39,780 comprehensive patient access cases, of which 80 percent were cancer cases.
National Patient Advocate Foundation
http://www.npaf.org
Leading naþionale grup de pacienþi, îndeamnã oficiali guvernamentali de a pãstra accesul agenþilor de stimulare a eritropoezei, pentru pacienþii cu cancer - Leading National Patient Group Urges Government Officials To Preserve Access To Erythropoiesis Stimulating Agents For Cancer Patients - articole medicale engleza - startsanatate