Since the first checkpoint inhibitor was approved in 2011, we have made tremendous leaps in immunotherapy in a short span of 10 years. Now we see immunotherapy combined with a variety of options, including chemotherapy or other oral and IV targeted therapy.
Immunotherapy has revolutionized cancer treatment, especially for patients with diseases considered otherwise incurable. Since May 2017, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved 27 immunotherapy combinations, including chemoimmunotherapy and regimens with targeted therapies, and researchers are reporting highly promising data from clinical trials of its combination with radiation.
As cancer care delivery changes, oncology nurses step up to the challenge: they adapt and develop solutions to fuel the future of nursing education, certification, and practice. During the November 2021 ONS Hackathon™, launched in partnership with the Oncology Nursing Certification Corporation (ONCC), teams were tasked to identify methods that address issues in the delivery of cancer care and prepare the future nursing workforce to care for patients with cancer anywhere.
An estimated 16% of patients with cancer experience depressive spectrum disorders in oncologic, hematologic, and palliative care settings, seriously affecting their quality of life. Although conventional antidepressants can be effective in many situations, they are associated with adverse effects, such as fatigue, drowsiness, sleep difficulties, nausea, weight gain, nervousness, dry mouth, blurred vision and sexual dysfunction.
America must make a drastic change in its approach to addressing health disparities for it to ensure adequate healthcare delivery, according to the National Cancer Institute’s Continuing Umbrella of Research Experiences Distinguished Scholars October 2021 speaker Robert Winn, MD.
Unprecedented new funding will expand and diversify the country’s healthcare workforce, address workforce shortages, and support more than 22,700 healthcare providers committed to working in underserved communities, according to a statement from the White House. Vice President Kamala Harris announced the $1.5 billion investment into the National Health Service Corps, Nurse Corps, and Substance Use Disorder Treatment and Recovery programs in November 2021.
Most lung cancers in patients who have no smoking history are the result of natural genetic variants in the body that can be classified into one of three molecular subtypes, researchers reported in study finding published in Nature Genetics.
On December 23, 1971, the National Cancer Act was signed into law by Former President Richard Nixon, granting authority to the National Cancer Institute (NCI) director to develop a national cancer program. In December 2021, First Lady Jill Biden celebrated the legislation’s 50th anniversary in an NCI video, in which she recognized the importance of the act, cancer advocacy, and the disease’s personal impact on her family.
Adding to its earlier approvals for use in adults with acute myeloid leukemia (AML), on August 25, 2021, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved ivosidenib (Tibsovo®) for adults with previously treated, locally advanced or metastatic cholangiocarcinoma. Cholangiocarcinoma, or cancer of the bile ducts, is a rare cancer, and ivosidenib is the only currently approved agent for patients with an IDH1 variant.
Nurses and other healthcare professionals persevered through 2021 and its obstacles, including the COVID-19 pandemic, staff shortages, and increasing rates of burnout, and their selflessness, drive, and honesty have not gone unnoticed by the American public, according to Gallup’s annual Most Honest and Ethical Professions Poll. In results released in January 2022, Americans ranked nurses as the most honest professionals for the 20th consecutive year on a list that also included physicians, grade-school teachers, pharmacists, and other professions.