ABOUT 3.6 million Italians live with cancer, in different stages of the disease and with different needs. We know that being treated in large centers where research is done and where experience is concentrated makes the difference, but also that, for many aspects of early diagnosis and follow-up, a “local” assistance model would be more useful and efficient. Is it possible to keep these two aspects together to better respond to patients’ needs? This is exactly what we are trying to do through local medicine. Why, as he explains Luigi Cavanna, President of the Scientific Society CIPOMO (Italian College of Primary Medical Oncologists in Hospital) and Director of the ASL of Piacenza, a better organization of the treatment path can reduce the time spent in the hospital and the travel and associated costs, promoting the quality of life. And, at the same time, it lightens the burden on the health system, optimizing economic and human resources. The topic is at the center of the third episode of the Roche Now talk: “It is demonstrated – explains the expert – that the distance from the treatment center has a statistically significant influence on some fundamental elements. For example, it contributes to late diagnosis. Being able to intercept the needs of the individual early in a pre-hospital phase would allow free resources to be allocated to patients who must necessarily be treated in hospital “.
The medicine of the future? Personalized, technological and close
As the pandemic has shown us, health and sustainability are moving in the same direction. “To make the system more sustainable – continues Cavanna – a fundamental element consists in the training of healthcare personnel, who are prepared both from a technical point of view and above all from a human point of view, remembering that the patient is first of all a person , with a unique experience and family, work and social history “. Therapeutic appropriateness, the involvement of patients in clinical trials and, finally, the ability to work in a network, for example, collaborating with centers that treat a high number of rare diseases, are essential. “The future – he concludes – is that of a more personalized medicine, which uses highly technological tools and which is closer to the patient”.