Roupen Odabashian, Hematology/Oncology Fellow at Karmanos Cancer Institute, and Podcast Host at OncoDaily, shared a post on LinkedIn:
“The problem with cancer treatment today:
We spend billions of dollars on cancer care!
We invent drugs that have many side effects and toxicities. These drugs may extend life by only six months, and we celebrate them.
Look at any clinical trial published in a prestigious journal, and you will see survival gains of, at most, two years.
But we don’t cure anyone.
Cancer usually comes back.
The real question is when.
Why are we practicing reactive medicine?
Why do we wait until someone walks into the clinic with stage IV cancer before we treat them?
The prevention space is weak, yet prevention is key.
Right now, we are not doing well in cancer treatment. We can control cancer, not cure it!
The drugs we have are decent, but I rarely look someone in the eyes and say, ‘You are cured.’
I (and we should) want to prevent cancer; I am tired of treating it.”
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