Even though cancer center and health system leaders know this deep down, most also find no way better to measure the success of programs and providers than the inscrutable Relative Value Unit, or RVU.
By law, the Food and Drug Administration is required to determine whether a drug, device, biologic, or medical device is “safe and effective.” But the FDA determination does not control whether the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will pay for it. To satisfy CMS, medical products and services must be “reasonable and necessary,” meaning...
As a radiation oncologist, I am struck by how often the decisive variable in lung cancer is not the sophistication of our therapy, but the timing of our encounter with the disease. The American Cancer Society projects 618,120 cancer deaths in the United States in 2025, with lung cancer remaining as the single largest contributor,...
