TY - JOUR
T1 - Treatment challenges in and outside a network setting
T2 - Soft tissue sarcomas
AU - Pasquali, Sandro
AU - Bonvalot, Sylvie
AU - Tzanis, Dimitri
AU - Casali, Paolo G.
AU - Trama, Annalisa
AU - Gronchi, Alessandro
AU - RARECARENet Working Group
AU - Filiberti, Rosa
PY - 2017
Y1 - 2017
N2 - Patients with soft tissue sarcoma (STS) experienced better outcomes when treated according to existing clinical practice guidelines either at reference institution or dedicated treatment networks. Despite increasing evidence supporting referral to sarcoma specialised units, up to half of patients are not managed according to guidelines, particularly those in the early stage of their disease requiring surgery. Also, criteria to certify expertise of institutions, such as the treatment volume, are debated and health authorities have only recently started identification of these centres and creation of treatment networks in Europe as well as in several countries. This process have important implications for both patient outcomes and innovation of existing treatment strategies through clinical research, making improvement of clinical pathways a priority for health care authorities. This article will discuss issues with management of patients with STS, such as pathological diagnosis and adherence to guidelines, and the definition of referral centres and networks will be illustrated along with existing experiences and population-based data.
AB - Patients with soft tissue sarcoma (STS) experienced better outcomes when treated according to existing clinical practice guidelines either at reference institution or dedicated treatment networks. Despite increasing evidence supporting referral to sarcoma specialised units, up to half of patients are not managed according to guidelines, particularly those in the early stage of their disease requiring surgery. Also, criteria to certify expertise of institutions, such as the treatment volume, are debated and health authorities have only recently started identification of these centres and creation of treatment networks in Europe as well as in several countries. This process have important implications for both patient outcomes and innovation of existing treatment strategies through clinical research, making improvement of clinical pathways a priority for health care authorities. This article will discuss issues with management of patients with STS, such as pathological diagnosis and adherence to guidelines, and the definition of referral centres and networks will be illustrated along with existing experiences and population-based data.
KW - Guidelines
KW - Network
KW - Referral centre
KW - Sarcoma
KW - Treatment
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U2 - 10.1016/j.ejso.2017.09.015
DO - 10.1016/j.ejso.2017.09.015
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85030482966
JO - European Journal of Surgical Oncology
JF - European Journal of Surgical Oncology
SN - 0748-7983
ER -