Delays in diagnosis are one of the main factors associated with reduced survival rates for lung cancer patients. Clinical guidelines have been implemented in some countries to standardize the diagnosis process, better define the time from diagnosis to the beginning of treatment, and to improve clinical results in lung cancer. In Australia, periods of 14 days from the initial referral of the GP to the first specialty consultation, and also from diagnosis to the first treatment are recommended. However, previous reviews showed an average time of 27 days for lung cancer diagnosis, with time distributions below those recommended by international guidelines (ranging from 6 to 45 days). Across all three modalities, a treatment delay of four weeks is associated with an increase in the risk of death.

In this TOGA Podcast, we will discuss some of the challenges associated with treatment delay and how we can improve these for lung cancer patients in Australia. Dr Mal Itchins, is a thoracic medical oncologist at Royal North Shore Hospital, GenesisCare, and North Shore Private; Professor Wendy Cooper,  Staff Specialist in Tissue Pathology and Diagnostic Oncology at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital and Mr Phillip Antippa a specialist Cardiothoracic surgeon and the Head of Thoracic Surgical Services at The Royal Melbourne Hospital and the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, join us in the conversation.

Thank you to Novartis for sponsoring this TOGA Podcast.

Reference:

ASPiRATION is an observational cohort study to assess the clinical impact of comprehensive genomic profiling in metastatic lung cancer patients. Find more information here: https://thoraciconcology.org.au/aspiration/