Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Ben Stiller Credits Controversial Prostate Screening For Saving His Life
Stat: Ben Stiller Reveals Prostate Cancer Diagnosis, Says PSA Test Saved His Life
Ben Stiller has been treated for prostate cancer, he revealed on “The Howard Stern Show” Tuesday, after his doctors diagnosed him in June 2014. He is now cancer-free, and he credits his health to a controversial screening test that has divided experts because of its potential for overtreating slow-growing tumors. “Taking the PSA test saved my life,” Stiller wrote in a blog post on Medium Tuesday. The PSA test detects an enzyme, prostate specific antigen, that is released by prostate cells. Elevated levels of PSA could indicate cancer. (Love, 10/4)
Kaiser Health News: Pricey New Treatment Roils Issues Of How To Treat Prostate Cancer
Men hoping to avoid some side effects of prostate cancer treatment are shelling out tens of thousands of dollars for a procedure whose long-term effects are unknown and insurers, including Medicare, won’t pay for. Proponents say high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) can have fewer negative side effects than surgery or radiation, while giving some patients another option between actively watching their cancer and those more aggressive steps. Critics, however, say the procedure is being oversold, leading some patients to get a treatment they don’t need. (Appleby, 10/5)
In other news —
Stat: Novel Pancreatic Cancer Trial Aims To Give Patients More Options
Just 3 percent of adult cancer patients participate in clinical trials of experimental treatments. In a novel effort to boost that number, a national nonprofit is launching an unusual study — one that allows patients to move easily between several experimental therapies, without spending precious time trying to find and qualify for a new trial if the first one doesn’t help.Once they’re in, they’re in.“The current clinical trials system doesn’t match what a patient needs,” said Julie Fleshman, president and CEO of the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, which organized the $35 million “Precision Promise” platform announced on Tuesday. “This is all about doing that.” (Begley, 10/4)
The Washington Post: This 8-Year-Old Is Free Of Cancer — For Now — After A ‘Breakthrough’ Treatment
By the time 8-year-old Ava Christianson got to the National Institutes of Health this summer, she had lost several grueling rounds to leukemia and was bracing for the next one. Intensive chemotherapy, which cures up to 90 percent of children with the most common type of leukemia, hadn’t kept her cancer from coming back. Neither had a painful bone-marrow transplant nor an experimental treatment. Her careworn father cried in the shower to hide his anguish. Her mother couldn’t help but wonder, “Why is this happening to our child?” (McGinley, 10/4)
