Quote:
Originally Posted by djplong
From:
http://www.usatoday.com/yourlife/hea...le+Feedfetcher
Do you think a private insurance company would cover this?
Do you think Medicare should cover this?
Would you trade paying for glasses for a thousand people so one person could get four more months of life (and consider the quality of those four months)?
I mean, if this drug CURED prostate cancer, I think you'd have a decent argument for it. |
There is more to this quote and what is covered in this story.
Provenge was used in a clinical trial that enrolled men who had ADVANCED prostate cancer and had failed all previous treatments and medications. The participants were split into two groups, one group receiving Provenge and one group receiving a placebo. If the disease continued to progress for men in the placebo group, they were allowed to cross over into the treatment group. Therefore, the actual efficacy of Provenge on ADVANCED prostate cancer patients could well be more than four months.
What is really needed is trial of Provenge for recently diagnosed prostate cancer patients who do not have ADVANCED disease to determine what Provenge would do for these type of patients. INSTEAD of being treated by surgery, radiation, seed implants, hormonal therapies, etc. which can easily exceed $93,000 in treatment costs. It may well turn out that this drug can indeed CURE prostate cancer or eliminate the current treatments and their terrible side effects (impotence, incontinence, etc.).
If you would like to hear what a leading prostate cancer oncologist has to say about Provenge, click on this link and watch the video at the bottom of the page dated May 18, 2010.
http://askdrmyers.wordpress.com/category/provenge/