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Result
Several barriers were identified that may contribute to suboptimal biomarker testing including lack of patient and physician awareness, inadequate tissue sampling, slow turn-around time, limited availability in some community settings, and health policy issues surrounding access, cost, and reimbursement. Patient advocacy groups are well positioned to address the lack of patient awareness with education campaigns. However, the lack of consistent language to describe biomarker testing among organizations is a barrier. To address this issue, advocacy groups need to align on common terminology and messaging with regard to biomarkers. Two potential approaches to achieve this goal include: 1) collaboration to develop joint educational material or 2) collaboration to develop a shared consensus statement including best practices and common core items or ‘building blocks’ for use by each organization to develop their own materials. As a first step, consistent messaging with regard to the Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How of biomarker testing are needed. Understanding gaps in physician knowledge regarding biomarker testing and development of initiatives to address these gaps are also warranted.
Conclusion
Additional patient and physician education are needed to establish biomarker testing as part of standard of care in patients with advanced-stage NSCLC, with the ultimate goal being that the patient has a full biomarker panel available (or at least tests in progress) at their first appointment with an oncologist. A unified effort from lung cancer advocacy organizations, healthcare providers, and industry partners is needed to achieve this goal.
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