Medical Lessons

Today the NY Times printed the third part of Amy Harmon’s excellent feature on the ups and downs and promise of some clinical trials for cancer. The focus is on a new drug, PLX4032, some people with melanoma who chose to try this exper­i­mental agent, and the oncol­o­gists who pre­scribed it to them. What I like about this story is that, besides offering some insight on the drug itself, it bal­ances the patients’ and doctors’ per­spec­tives; it explains why some people might elect to take a new med­ication in an early-​​stage clinical trial and why some physi­cians push for these pro­tocols because they think it’s best for their patients. And it pro­vides a window into the world of aca­demic med­icine, where doctors’ col­lab­orate among them­selves and some­times with cor­po­ra­tions. Here’s some of what I learned:

See more Today’s Press on Tar­geted Therapy for Cancer