Our collaboration’s shared vision and commitment will allow researchers and clinicians to continue to work together to discover and provide new approaches to cancer care.
Forty percent of us will develop cancer in our lifetime. Twenty percent will die from it. Despite tremendous strides in science and clinical care, the incidence of cancer is skyrocketing — due to an aging population and increasing rates of early-onset cancers among younger people. The reality is more people need more advanced care now than ever before, and even more will need it in the future.
To better serve our patients and community, we must act.
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center recently announced a clinical collaboration that offers the kind of innovative approach to cancer that our patients need and deserve. It includes a proposal to build the region’s only freestanding, adult inpatient cancer hospital, which represents a sea-change approach to cancer care in the region.
Leading cancer centers around the country, including Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York and MD Anderson Cancer Center in Texas, have adopted a similarly dedicated model for many reasons. Among them are hospitals experienced with increasingly complex treatment protocols, specialized multidisciplinary teams singularly dedicated to cancer patients, and, most important, a record of higher survival rates.
If the mission is to truly defy cancer, to reduce the burden of this disease on patients and families, one need look only at the outcomes. Published data show patients cared for in dedicated cancer hospitals have better outcomes than patients who receive their care at general hospitals. And it makes sense. When all you do is cancer, when the brightest minds work together as a single, highly specialized team, patterns emerge, and you can see things others do not see.
We recognize that a freestanding cancer hospital requires close integration with the expertise of a comprehensive academic medical center. The proximity of the newly proposed cancer center built between the Dana-Farber and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) campuses means patients will benefit from the knowledge and skills of the world-class medical and surgical clinicians at BIDMC. Dana-Farber and BIDMC will also share pathology and radiology services.
Patients from all over the globe come to Boston because they know, if there is an answer, it can be found here. Consistently ranked among the very best cancer centers in the world, every single person on the Dana-Farber campus — from the valet who parks cars to the clinicians dedicated to patient care — is focused on a single mission: defeating cancer.
BIDMC, a renowned Harvard Medical School-affiliated academic medical center, is ranked second only to Dana-Farber among cancer programs in New England. Both institutions have Magnet designation, which recognizes the highest level of patient care and is held by less than 10 percent of hospitals in the country. The Dana-Farber clinical faculty and the outstanding Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians at BIDMC will join forces to do what we have done independently decade after decade: prioritize patient care above all else.
Embracing the profound responsibility of being a National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center, Dana-Farber explored every option on the landscape to continue bringing the most cutting-edge cancer care to Boston and to the broader region. Leaders at Dana-Farber and BIDMC and Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians have a common vision of what this means and what it will take. Together, we decided to create this collaboration to realize the clear benefits of providing exceptional care in an environment solely focused on cancer and to expand access to equitable care across the diverse communities we serve. We fashioned a collaboration designed to achieve these objectives in the most cost-effective way possible and without disrupting the care our patients receive.
On the important point of health care cost containment, we know that hospital care is responsible for nearly a third of all health care spending. Over the past two years, Dana-Farber piloted an acute care outpatient clinic for our patients that resulted in a 20 percent reduction in hospital admissions through the emergency room. BIDMC provides high-quality care at a lower cost than other large hospitals in Massachusetts.
BIDMC is widely known for providing high-value care.
As Harvard-affiliated institutions, both Dana-Farber and BIDMC have world-leading reputations for scientific discoveries, exceptional patient care, and transformative medicine. Our collaboration’s shared vision and commitment will allow researchers and clinicians to continue to work together to discover and provide new approaches to cancer care, confident in the ongoing support and investment required for specialized equipment and clinical services necessary to provide the very highest level of care.
We believe the best way to fully meet the demands of the future — to defy cancer by meeting its increasing pace with extraordinary care — is with a continued commitment to research and patient care and a dedicated adult inpatient cancer hospital highly integrated with a superb academic medical center.
Cancer care is changing. We want to lead that change. Together.
This article originally appeared in The Boston Globe.