A new cancer center model is helping meet the demand for better quality cancer care in community settings.
An original paper in ADC Review | Journal of Antibody-drug Conjugates, a peer-reviewed journal published by InPress Media Group, LLC, describes the concept.
Hybrid academic-community cancer centers began emerging and evolving at several sites in some southern and mid-Atlantic states during the last several years. In February 2017 a number of their directors, and other key members of their respective institutions, gathered for a CME-sponsored full-day workshop in Miami, Fla., to share experiences and best practices to advance the model.
Cancer centers qualified to be classified as hybrid academic-community cancer centers shared the following attributes:
- Most recruited respected academic-clinician leaders from NCI-designated comprehensive cancer centers;
- They were established at large, well-respected, financially secure not-for-profit regional community hospital systems interested in increasing quality of care and standards of practice;
- They sought to infuse greater academic rigor into their programs, develop translational research programs, enroll more patients from their respective communities into clinical trials, and provide the best cancer care to populations not served by traditional academic centers;
- They often adapted existing resources through collaborative efforts rather than reinventing the wheel.
According to Erich Mounce, Chief Executive Officer of West Cancer Center, “The development of the hybrid cancer center is an important evolution for cancer care. Combining the best practices and services from each model (community and academic) allows the patients to experience the intimacy and connections that so dominate community practice and the scientific specialization, innovative therapies and procedures developed and utilized in so many academic cancer centers. At West Cancer Center, like other evolving hybrid cancer centers, we are following a journey to integrate the best of both types of centers.”
“Since hybrid academic-community cancer centers share common attributes but differ in structure, as the article shows, it’s important that leaders of these centers, as well as those aspiring to hybrid status, continue to meet and discuss the ever-evolving state of this new cancer center model,” said Eric T. Rosenthal, lead author of the study, who added it’s also important to monitor and measure effectiveness in improving patient care in each center’s respective community.
The centers represented were Baptist Health South Florida’s Miami Cancer Institute, Miami, Fla.; West Cancer Center, Memphis, Tenn.; Inova Schar Cancer Institute, Falls Church, Va.; and Gibbs Cancer Center and Research Institute, Spartanburg Regional Healthcare System, Spartanburg, SC.
Participants discussed how and why their centers were created, academic partnerships, future goals, and opportunities and challenges in research, treatment, recruitment, marketing, and fundraising, among other issues.
The conference was organized and moderated by Rosenthal, Editor-at-Large of Onco’Zine (http://www.oncozine.com), who first identified, named, and described the concept in a series of articles appearing in MedPage Today in 2015.
The article “The Nature and Nurturing of Hybrid Academic-Community Cancer Centers,” was co-authored by Rosenthal and the cancer center directors, Michael Zinner, MD, Lee S. Schwartzberg, MD, Donald L. “Skip” Trump, MD, and Timothy J. Yeatman, MD and was published in ADC Review | Journal of Antibody-drug Conjugates | DOI: 10.14229/jadc.2017.11.27.001
To read the full article, visit http://www.prweb.com/releases/prweb14986812.htm.