Patients Rising joined forces with IASLC and lung cancer advocates from around the globe at the 2015 World Conference on Lung Cancer.
Among the topics discussed at the World Conference on Lung Cancer:
Access to Care: What are the Stakes for Lung Cancer Patients?
- Access means getting the right treatment to the right patient right now. It’s that simple. What are the most prominent regulatory and reimbursement challenges facing lung cancer patients worldwide?
- How can we as advocates help increase participation in clinical trials and open up opportunities for more patients to access life-saving and innovative treatments?
- Today, only 4% of lung cancer patients are currently enrolled in a clinical trial – that is a crisis! What do we do now?
- How can international advocates help support global access solutions?
- What is our Call To Action?
Lung Cancer Screening Worldwide
- The current lung cancer screening protocol is in desperate need of reform. How can it be streamlined like mammograms and PSA testing?
- What are the major obstacles to creating a better patient-screening program – especially since the only current criteria are being a pack-a-day smoker for 20 years?
- What lung cancer screening recommendations are currently being developed in different countries?
- Is a universal screening program possible? What can we as advocates do together to help achieve that goal?
- What is our Call To Action?
MODERATOR: Terry Wilcox, Co-Founder & Executive Director of Patients Rising. As the former Executive Director and Creative Director of Vital Options International for seven years, she has produced dozens of panel discussions around the globe covering access issues, screening protocols, value vs. cost and personalized medicine. She recently co-founded Patients Rising with her husband, Jonathan Wilcox, to meet the growing needs of patients today who are challenged by barriers to new, life-changing diagnostics, therapeutics and all facets of the treatments they need to LIVE.
PANELISTS / FEATURED GUESTS:
Bonnie J. Addario, Founder, Chair & Lung Cancer Survivor of the Bonnie J. Addario Lung Cancer Foundation has been an activist, advocate, educator and change agent empowering patients and giving them a strong voice in the fight against lung cancer since receiving a stage 3B diagnosis more than a decade ago. Although thrust into a role that she had never envisioned for herself, she embraced it and now considers it to be her second career and a personal calling. Recognizing the critical need for education, empowerment, advocacy and research to help patients and families, especially those without resources and support, Bonnie and her family founded the Bonnie J. Addario Lung Cancer Foundation (ALCF) in 2006, and then went on to found the Addario Lung Cancer Medical Institute (ALCMI) with her husband, Tony Addario, in 2008.
Gilberto Lopes, a medical oncologist at Centro Paulista de Oncologia, heads HCor Onco, the cancer center for Hospital do Coração, and leads the medical and scientific council for the Oncoclinicas group, a network of 28 clinics and 200 oncologists in Brazil. He was previously Senior Consultant Medical Oncologist, Program Leader for Health Economics and Outcomes Research and Assistant Director for Clinical Research at the Johns Hopkins Singapore International Medical Centre from 2006 to 2013; he holds concomitant positions as Assistant Professor of Oncology at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, as well as teaching faculty at the Perdana Graduate School of Medicine in Serdang, Malaysia.After obtaining his medical degree in Brazil, he undertook an internship, residency in internal medicine and fellowship in Hematology/Oncology at the University of Miami where he became Chief Medical Resident and Clinical Instructor. His research interests include health economics; policy and access to cancer drugs and treatment in low and middle income countries.
Kwun Fong, MBBS, FRACP, PhD, is a thoracic and sleep physician at The Prince Charles Hospital in Brisbane, Australia. His research interests include the molecular basis of cancer, screening and early detection, genomics and epigenomics, translational medicine and health technologies. Dr. Fong earned his medical degree from the University of London and his doctorate from the University of Queensland. His specialty is thoracic medicine (pulmonology).
Emily Bennett Taylor was diagnosed at Stage IV when she was 28 years old, a former college athlete, never-smoker, and an active, healthy person. She was shocked, but ready to attack this thing with everything she had. She underwent 8 rounds of chemotherapy, and was fortunate to have an excellent response. She and her husband canvassed the country for a surgeon who would operate on her, and found that in Dr. Raja Flores at Mt. Sinai in NYC. They re-located from Los Angeles to NY for 3 months, and in February of 2013 Dr. Flores removed her entire right lung. The surgery went well, and a month later she began high-dose radiation to the cavity in her right chest. She has now been NED (No Evidence of Disease) for almost two years. She now works as a Spokesperson and Patient Advocate for the Bonnie J. Addario Lung Cancer Foundation (ALCF), fulfilling her promise to herself and hopefully giving patients the same hope that the ALCF instilled in her. To learn more about Emily please visit her blog.
