Radio Rare

Our CEO, Christine Cockburn, caught up with James Valentine recently on ABC Radio.

They chatted about James’s own experience with cancer, Oesophageal Cancer Awareness Month, and the devastating inequities facing people diagnosed with rare or less common cancers. 

Every year, more than 40,000 Australians are diagnosed with some form of rare cancer. And for those who are, treatments can be hard to find. And they can be expensive if you can get them.  Sarah McGoram knows this firsthand. 

She was diagnosed with a rare cancer at just 18 years of age, and still lives with it today. This weekend, Sarah will climb Australia's tallest mountain as part of Rare Cancer Australia's Kosi Challenge.

Two-year-old Luna’s family is fundraising for treatments only available overseas for her rare childhood cancer, neuroblastoma. They sat down with Gary Hardgrave on the 4BC Radio Drive program to share their experiences.

People living with cancer urgently need action on expanded access to precision therapies

Over the past two decades, our ability to rapidly obtain genomic information on an individual and their cancer has led to a dramatic shift in how we can diagnose, treat, monitor and prevent cancer, leading to an era of precision oncology.

With this expanded knowledge of cancer there are several promising treatments that can specifically target the drivers of an individual’s cancer, that are already under review through Australia’s health technology assessment process. Too many people living with cancer in Australia still don’t have access; and they can’t afford to wait.

In this edition of The Conversation Hour, hosted by ABC Radio Melbourne, we hear the experiences of callers who have been diagnosed with a rare cancer and their families. We also learn about the latest developments in treatment and support with guests Professor Clare Scott who is a clinician scientist, leading the ovarian and rare cancer laboratory at WEHI and Danielle Spence from the Cancer Council Victoria.

Credits

Richelle Hunt, Presenter

All rights belong to ABC Radio Melbourne.

Noel Carmona, living with thymic carcinoma, and Rare Cancers Australia CEO Christine Cockburn, sat down with ABC Radio in the Upper Hunter to talk about the cost of treatment for people diagnosed with a rare cancer, and what needs to change to make things fair for rare.

Professor Grant McArthur

· The challenges of personalising cancer treatment

· How the moon landing sparked a career in medicine

· Why he chose to specialise in cancer, and melanoma

· What gets him out of bed in the morning, and what drives him

· The vision of the VCCC, and how it came about

· Why he moved from a full-time research and clinical role to a leadership position

· The sensitivities around prescribing medications that are not PBS funded

· The gaps between published evidence, TGA approval and PBS listing

· Ideas on how to speed up patient access to life-extending and life-saving treatment

· The challenges and opportunities of developing combination treatments

· How we can continue to improve cancer outcomes in the next 10 years

More about Professor Grant McArthur

In this episode, RCA Chief Executive Richard Vines speaks to Professor Ian Frazer about:

Ian and his colleague co-invented the technology behind the world’s first cervical cancer vaccine.

He is the founding CEO of the Translational Research Institute in Brisbane, heads a biotechnology company working on new vaccine technologies, and chairs the advisory board of the Medical Research Future Fund.

Ann Single

- The limitations of Australia’s Health Technology Assessment (HTA) process

More about Ann Single