Proclaiming a collaborative relationship with another medical center to be mutually beneficial has come to be rather common among hospitals in an era of health care consolidation. In the case of The Stamford Hospital Carl & Dorothy Bennett Cancer Center, which last year became the first Connecticut-based member of the Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women”™s Cancer Care Collaborative, the dividends are already being reaped.
Arguably the most notable of those is the FDA”™s Oct. 18 approval of Yescarta (axicabtagene ciloleucel), a cell-based gene therapy, to treat adult patients with certain types of large B-cell lymphoma who have not responded to or who have relapsed after at least two other kinds of treatment.
Yescarta, a chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy, is the second gene immunotherapy approved by the FDA and the first for certain types of non-Hodgkin”™s lymphoma.
What made the approval especially satisfying for Dr. K.M. Steve Lo, a hematology and oncology specialist at the Bennett Center, is that one of his patients ”” Frank Colandro, owner of Mama Carmela”™s Italian Deli in Darien ”” took part in a Yescarta clinical trial.
“It”™s a horrible disease,” Lo said of Colandro”™s non-Hodgkin”™s lymphoma. “He was in a very tenuous situation. If we didn”™t get it under control, he would have died within months.”
Lo started Colandro on chemotherapy, which kept the disease in remission for about two years. But when the cancer returned in 2015, Colandro and his oncologist began exploring other possibilities.
“He went to (Memorial) Sloan-Kettering for options, but they really didn”™t have anything to offer,” Lo said. “I knew that there were a number of studies open at Dana-Farber, so then it became a question of what is the best study for him?”
Interested in an immunotherapy approach, Lo enrolled Colandro in one study that “didn”™t pan out,” he said. After discussing the case further with his Dana-Farber Cancer Institute colleagues in Boston, Lo ultimately enrolled Colandro in the Yescarta study.
“He was the first patient in what turned out to be a pivotal study,” Lo said. “He”™s now been in remission since February of last year, and that is amazing.”
Lo said he and other Stamford Hospital personnel meet with Dana-Farber specialists via videoconference every two weeks. With the collaboration, “We can position patients to get immediate treatments right from the get-go,” he said. “We”™re having constant discussions about different cases
and studies.”
The doctor said he mostly treats breast cancer patients, many of whom are facing their second or third operation. One patient, he said, had received conflicting medical advice on what to do next. Reviewing her case during a videoconference with Dana-Farber specialists, Lo said he was able to get a consensus from “four renowned experts in Boston” on the next best steps for treatment.
“It”™s a little like getting a second opinion, but given the expertise involved, it goes well beyond that,” Lo said. As for his patient, “I remember her saying, ”˜This peace of mind is priceless.”™”
The wear-and-tear on a cancer patient of travel to receive care can also be eliminated by the collaboration, the doctor said. He noted that Stamford patients with
complex cancers can receive expedited access to Dana-Farber’s main campus in Boston.
“This is better in some ways than schlepping up to one of the big institutions and seeing one specialist,” Lo said. “This is a tremendous resource and one that allows us to be constantly learning how to better serve our patients.”
He described the institutional collaboration as a “win for patients, for us and for Dana-Farber, because they”™re able to learn from us as well. It”™s many times a
two-way street.”
A conference will take place in Boston in December to discuss further expanding and improving the Stamford oncology program, Lo said, as well as in treating cancer patients in gastrointestinal, urinary and prostate and other areas.
