Tag: decision

Making Complex Decisions When Confronted With Conflicting Opinions

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Dr. Ramesh, a dermatologist from Tirupathi, traveled to Chennai with his father-in-law, Mr. Subramaniam, who had been diagnosed with prostate cancer. It had been diagnosed at an early stage and there was a good chance that the right treatment could lead to a complete cure. Mr. Subramaniam was a fit 61-year-old who went for walks in the morning and was in great physical shape. He looked forward to beating the disease. Owing to the contacts of Dr. Ramesh, they were able to get appointments with two oncologists at a top private hospital in Chennai. They felt enthused that this trip would be successful and that they would get clarity on the path forward. After they met with the two specialists, the family seemed more confused than ever. The surgical oncologist recommended immediate surgery and the radiation oncologist opined that radiation followed by chemotherapy would be the recommended course of action. Even though both of these specialists were practicing in the same hospital, the patient needed to take separate appointments and the treatment advice was contradictory with neither consulting the other.

Cancer decisions are complex as they require multidisciplinary opinions.  Treatment plans need to be decided by a group of doctors who discuss and weigh the pros and cons of the various treatment paths. In a tertiary care center like Tata Memorial Center or Stanford Medical Center, a case like this would involve a decision being made by a tumor board. A tumor board typically consists of a diagnostic radiologist, pathologist, surgeon, medical oncologist and a radiation oncologist getting together in the same room to discuss the case. A decision is first taken on the diagnosis and staging of the disease where the pathologist and diagnostic radiologist weigh in. Once this is completed, the surgeon, medical oncologist and radiation oncologist decide on the treatment path. The intent is to recommend a path that will provide a complete cure or extend years of cancer free survival or improve quality of life. This can be possible through surgery if the disease is localized and operable. Sometimes the surgeon will suggest that the tumor be shrunk through chemotherapy or radiation and then the patient get operated. Having all relevant specialists weigh in and review the case is the ideal scenario but this is unfortunately not the modus operandi in most hospitals.

Given the contradictory paths presented to them, Dr. Ramesh decided to approach Tata Memorial Center. They became aware of the online opinion service available and registered on www.navya.care. He uploaded all of his father-in-law’s reports following which a Navya clinical analyst reached out to him to not only understand the medical history but also all questions they needed answered. “We believed that we had gone to one of the best hospitals in South India and had met with two reputed oncologists. Even though I am a doctor myself, we were in a quandary as we were given contradictory opinions. Given this situation, we wanted to know from Tata Memorial Center how we should proceed in this case. Navya expedited our request and within 24 hours, we got a report that included the consensus of opinions from three experts including a surgical oncologist, a medical oncologist, and a radiation oncologist. The report was detailed and mentioned all of the treatment options and the reasons for recommended path. A clinical trial was also considered which gave us the peace of mind that no stone was left unturned.” The treatment recommended was to follow chemotherapy at this time and then consider definitive or curative therapy which could either be surgery or targeted radiation. The path was clear and the patient underwent a cycle of chemotherapy and the family heaved a collective sigh of relief.

Gaining access to even one oncologist can be challenging. Consulting more than one is often not possible, and even when it is, it takes up significant time. Given the criticality of timely treatment, the process of consulting several oncologists can be physically and emotionally draining and can lead to contradictory opinions which lead to confusion. To ensure that the treatment plan is comprehensive and is arrived at after considering all options, Navya processes cases by incorporating opinions of several experts from renowned cancer centers such as Tata Memorial Centre or expert centers such part of National Cancer Grid. Using Navya’s ExpertApp, case details and possible treatment options are sent to multiple experts who discuss the case online and build a multidisciplinary consensus opinion.

Says Dr. Abhishek Mahajan, a diagnostic radiologist at Tata Memorial Centre:”I am able to look at DICOM (Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine) images to confirm the diagnosis and staging of the cancer. In some cases, there can be a question of the origin of the cancer. In one case, the treating oncologist needed to know whether it was a case of liver cancer or if it was a cancer that had spread to the liver.” The therapies recommended for each of these cases could be very different.

“Treatment decision making in oncology is essentially a joint discussion between all care givers, aiming towards the best course forward for the patient. At times, only surgery and radiation may suffice without chemotherapy, or chemotherapy and radiation can make surgery easier, and at times single modalities of treatment like chemotherapy or radiation may be all that the patient requires. What matters most is the optimal timing and selection of right modality of treatment. Navya, through the online ExpertApp, brings together a nuanced consensus from opinions of all the experts, in a language and manner understandable to all stakeholders, thus the best possible care for the patient” says Dr. Tushar Vora, medical oncologist at Tata Memorial Center.

Urging family members of cancer patients, Gitika Srivastava, Founder of Navya, shares her personal viewpoint:  “Most people who have had any experience with cancer are aware of TMC and that it is one of the largest tertiary care centers in the world. However, not everyone from far flung areas can come to Mumbai or is aware of the significance of a proper choice in treatment to a change in outcomes. Given the cases we have seen, we would urge everyone to get an expert opinion online at http://www.navya.care.  You can be assured that the opinion rests on the experience of world renowned cancer experts and follows evidence based protocols best suited to your loved one’s specific case.”

National Cancer Grid (NCG), tmc.gov.in/ncg Tata Memorial Centre (TMC) tmc.gov.in

The NCG is a consortium of 104 cancer centers, with a mandate to standardize cancer care, nationally. NCG is the largest global network of cancer centers collaborating to use technology and training to bring cancer expertise to every oncologist and cancer patient in India. TMC is Asia’s largest leading tertiary care expert cancer center, seeing over 67,000 cancer patients every year. Its strength necessitates a responsibility to make its expertise available to patients across India and developing countries, especially those who reside in locations where there are no expert cancer care centers.

Navya http://www.navya.info

Navya is a clinical informatics and patient services organization with a unique understanding of cancer patients and oncologists and a core commitment to cancer care. With a proven track record of successfully implementing innovative solutions that are low cost and effective, Navya is the first to develop technology systems specific to Indian cancer data for use by cancer patients and oncologists in India.  Contact:  Gitika Srivastava | gitika@post.harvard.edu

Twitter: https://twitter.com/NavyaCare

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NavyaNetwork/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/15236089

PRESS RELEASE

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Confronted With Complex Cancer Treatment Decisions – Navya Empowers Patients With the Consensus Opinion of an Expert Panel of Multidisciplinary Oncologists

 

Navya in partnership with Tata Memorial Center (TMC) and National Cancer Grid (NCG) enables cancer patients to have their cases reviewed by a multidisciplinary panel of experts, to arrive at the best possible treatment plan. This is critically important as cancer decisions are complex and often involve several organs and types of treatments.

A woman with advanced breast cancer may need surgical removal of the breast, radiation therapy to the brain, and multiple lines of chemotherapy with side effects impacting the heart and the liver.  Therefore, it is critical that experts in each of the specialties collaborate to determine the treatment plan; from radiologists reading mammograms and brain scans to breast oncology surgeons, neuro oncology radiation experts, and medical oncology experts.

While leading medical institutes across the world consider multidisciplinary treatment planning to be the standard of care, extreme shortage of cancer experts in India means that this is not the norm. A medical oncologist may treat breast cancer (solid tumor) and Leukemia (liquid tumor), and determine the radiation dosage for treatment.

Further, choices such as chemotherapy versus surgery, aggressive therapy versus supportive care, or Hail Mary attempts with expensive targeted therapies or enrolling in clinical trials, require evidence based knowledge and experience treating thousands of complex cases.  Such nuanced decision making weighing pros and cons of each treatment path is only possible when experts collaborate on a multidisciplinary tumor board.

At world renowned cancer centers such as TMC in Mumbai or Dana Farber Cancer Institute at Harvard, all cases are reviewed by a tumor board of cancer experts who jointly arrive at a treatment decision.  By leveraging its patented technology and collaboration with the best cancer experts in the country, Navya replicates this gold standard in cancer treatment planning.

“TMC and Navya have collaborated since 2011 to develop an expert decision system that uses clinical informatics, predictive analytics and machine learning to recommend evidence and experience-based expert treatment decisions, similar to decisions made by expert tumor boards,” said Dr. Rajendra A. Badwe, Director of Tata Memorial Centre.

At multidisciplinary tumor board meetings, a pathologist, radiologist, surgeon, medical oncologist, and radiation oncologist get together in the same room to discuss each case.  Sometimes the surgeon will suggest that the tumor be shrunk through chemotherapy or radiation and then the patient get operated. At other times the radiation oncologist may determine that the tumor site is not safe to radiate. If the radiologist determines spread of cancer across organs, the medical oncologist may recommend chemotherapy alone.  Having all relevant specialists weigh in and review the case is the ideal scenario but this is unfortunately not the modus operandi in most hospitals.  This is where Navya comes in.

Mr. Shah’s father in Rajkot was diagnosed with a form of lung cancer following a routine checkup. Several tests followed and there was confusion as it could have been metastatic mesothelioma that may or may not be operable and therefore whether to proceed with surgery and radiation therapy or chemotherapy alone was unclear. They consulted oncologists in Ahmedabad, Mumbai, and also reached out to oncologist friends in the US.  The conflicting opinions meant that even though they had access to reputed oncologists, each was making a decision in a silo. In their relentless search for credible advice, they were made aware of http://www.navya.care and the fact that it offered multidisciplinary opinions. While the previous three weeks were chaotic with several view-points and a plethora of tests being recommended, the next 24 hours served to create order where there was chaos. Mr. Shah’s case was looked at by a team of experts that included the top thoracic surgeon in the country collaborating with a senior medical oncologist and radiation oncologist. The treatment path was clear and precise and helped the family move forward with confidence.

Says Mr Shah, “By the grace of God, we are not constrained by a lack of resources, and I was able to connect with several oncologists across India and the US. However, it was tough for us to assimilate the opinions and determine the one clear path to follow. We found that only Navya was able to do this and we are grateful for the clarity and thoroughness.”

To ensure that the treatment plan is comprehensive, Navya processes cases by incorporating opinions of several experts from Tata Memorial Centre and National Cancer Grid, a consortium of expert centers in India.

“Patients at small or remote centers will now have access to the world class expertise of cancer experts in India,” said Dr. C.S. Pramesh, Coordinator of the National Cancer Grid. “Treating oncologists can consult with multidisciplinary experts online in a simulated tumor board that results in expert treatment decisions for patients everywhere.”

www.navya.care leverages the power of the internet to make access to expert treatment decisions convenient, cost effective, and ubiquitous so every cancer patient receives a multidisciplinary opinion.  Patients simply upload their medical reports and decision questions and receive an expert opinion report within 24 hours.

Gitika Srivastava, Founder of Navya, says: “Most people who have had any experience with cancer know it’s not always possible to gain access to cancer experts.   Tata Memorial Centre, National Cancer Grid, and Navya are working to change this.  Every cancer patient has the right to an expert opinion.  We urge you to leverage  www.navya.care for an online opinion. You can be assured that the opinion rests on the multidisciplinary experience of world renowned cancer experts collaborating to deliver the best possible treatment plan uniquely suited to your case.”

Tata Memorial Centre (TMC) tmc.gov.in / National Cancer Grid (NCG), tmc.gov.in/ncg

TMC is Asia’s largest leading tertiary care expert cancer center, seeing over 67,000 cancer patients every year. Its strength necessitates a responsibility to make its expertise available to patients across India and developing countries, especially those who reside in locations where there are no expert cancer care centers.  The NCG is a consortium of 104 cancer centers, with a mandate to standardize cancer care, nationally. NCG is the largest global network of cancer centers collaborating to use technology and training to bring cancer expertise to every oncologist and cancer patient in India.\

Navya http://www.navya.info

Navya is a clinical informatics and patient services organization with a unique understanding of cancer patients and oncologists and a core commitment to cancer care. With a proven track record of successfully implementing innovative solutions that are low cost and effective, Navya is the first to develop technology systems specific to Indian cancer data for use by cancer patients and oncologists in India.  Contact:  Gitika Srivastava | gitika@post.harvard.edu

Twitter: https://twitter.com/NavyaCare

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NavyaNetwork/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/15236089

 

Expert Opinion for Cancer Care in 24 Hours

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TMC NCG Online – Navya Expert Opinion Service empowers patients with critical information within 24 hours enabling families to make robust decisions in cancer care with adequate inputs from oncologists at Tata Memorial Centre and National Cancer Grid (including cancer centers like AIIMS, Kidwai, Max Hospital, etc.). This service, available at www.navya.care, allows patients to upload their reports and get a response from world renowned experts.

Families seek to vet treatment plans with experts but it can be challenging as doctors often recommend the treatment start immediately to prevent cancer from advancing. Balancing the need to act quickly while ensuring the decision is made with all relevant inputs is when Navya’s Online Expert Opinion Service becomes a powerful ally.

While diagnosing the presence of cancer can be relatively straightforward, treatment is highly specialized and the number of experts experienced in managing complex cases is very few. Many cancers are curable or can be managed for a number of years if diagnosed early and treated appropriately. Choosing the right therapy can be the difference between the best possible outcome and failed treatment. Patients are able to receive the best possible treatment opinion which includes what therapy to choose (surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy or immunotherapy) as well as dosage, duration, side effects and other details pertinent to the treatment. The detailed report, that answers all questions asked by the patient in language that is simple to understand, can then be shared with the local oncologist to proceed with the treatment locally.

Maya Fonseca, 27, of Goa had a situation where following a routine checkup and follow up tests, her mother was diagnosed with stage IV cancer. The tests administered at the time were inconclusive as to the origin of the cancer. A slide review was recommended which would have taken 14 days but the treating oncologist advised that chemotherapy be commenced immediately. Maya and her family were understandably unsure of how and when to proceed with treatment. She reached out to Navya Online Expert Opinion Service and uploaded the reports. Navya’s patient advocate called her, got a thorough understanding of the case and noted all the questions that she wanted to ask the expert. The medical history along with evidence based treatment options were presented to an expert using Navya’s patented system for an opinion. The experts at Tata Memorial Centre were able to conclude that the medical reports and clinical history were consistent with cancer of the ovaries and chemotherapy was the next step followed by surgery.   On receiving the expert’s response, a report was created that answered all questions asked by the patient in language that was simple to understand. With the treatment opinion that included the chemotherapy, dosage and frequency, Maya’s mother was able to proceed with immediate treatment safe in the knowledge that she was making the right decision.

Urging families of cancer patients, Gitika Srivastava, Founder of Navya, says: “Most people who have had any experience with cancer are aware that given time and logistical constraints, it is not always feasible to go to tertiary care centers in metropolitan cities at each treatment decision point. Given the importance of treatment decisions in yielding the best possible outcomes, we would urge everyone to get an expert opinion through TMC NCG Online. We understand the anxiety in knowing what to do as quickly as possible, and hence have strived to ensure that we facilitate the opinion from the experts within 24 hours of getting all necessary medical reports. When making a decision on treatment, you and your oncologist can be assured that the opinion rests on the experience of world renowned cancer experts and follows evidence based protocols best suited to your specific case.”

Online Expert Opinion: Navya.Care

Tata Trusts: tatatrusts.org LinkedIn Facebook  Twitter

Tata Memorial Center: tmc.gov.in  Facebook

Navya: navyanetwork.com  LinkedIn  Facebook  Twitter

Decision Making

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flowers-164754_1280Decision making is about pros and cons.    I was on my way to Boston Logan, to catch my flight to Bangalore.  My cofounder called me, and said “it’s a Navya moment.”    There was a personal, family, decision that he was helping coordinate, while he was at the Maui airport to fly across the country to get to his family in New York City.   Between our flight schedules and travel times, we had about an hour or so to chat before certain important decision had to be made.   The clock was literally ticking, and we started our process.   He had looked up the papers that discussed clinical trials and retrospective analysis of individuals in similar circumstances as his kin.  (He will write about these experiences in a blog post, soon.)  The advantage of waiting versus proceeding with a surgery was about five days at most.   That, was the known.  The evidence.  That we could likely delay surgery by five days and gain the benefit that would bring.  However, the disadvantage, the unknown, the risk of any complication while waiting, far outweighed the known disadvantage (mandatory stay in a well-managed, top of the line, intensive care unit).   Then, the experts.    Experts known to us pointed to their experience of being able to manage any complexity of surgery at the time.   They were comfortable, confident, yet let us (the patient and the family) decide.  What did the patient want?  There was anxiety.  There was anxiety about the known and the unknown – what was worse?  What did she prefer?  Patient preference.  And then, the much talked about guidelines – the international guidelines that indicated that both, surgery and non-surgery were acceptable options at this time.  Brilliant!  Not helpful.   It was a Navya moment.  We had to reconcile, hold each other’s hands, and decide from the patient’s perspective.

There are many elements to decision making.  Evidence, experience, experts, and patient preference being the most measurable, computable, elements.  Guidelines of course are the most general and are the weakest link.   At the center though, is the process of utilizing and combining all of the above.  The Navya process, which is extendable from oncology to obstetrics decision making.   The gentle consideration, the conversations, the repeated conversations on the various considerations, the data, the people, the process.  Always results in a decision that is well thought out, bringing clarity, and rooted in the best evidence and experience of experts.   The Navya process that we followed in an hour long conversation lead to two beautiful outcomes, a pair of healthy baby twins, born at the right time to a mother who felt relieved with confidence in her decision. 

Evidence

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Navya Blog post image 1

Today I was reminded that evidence matters.   Evidence is the premise of Navya.  It is where we started.   Why we started.  We added on Experience, Experts, Patient Preference, and always knew that Guidelines are a sum total of many things but not enough to make a patient-specific decision.  With so much noise about so many systems and so many sources of information, (from structured guidelines to unstructured patient blogs and doctor’s notes and specific institution practices), all away from the core of Evidence, (clinical trial data), I began to wonder whether our premise was not what many would value.  (What a convoluted sentence construction – pretty similar to the obscurity of that thought).  Evidence matters.  Experts (or should I say mother of all experts…!) at Tata Memorial Centre are singularly focused on how an evidence based system can empower their decisions, above and beyond what their experience and standard guidelines can already do.  That, is the hallmark of expertise.  The definition.  An evidence based expert decision.

When I was asked to momentarily scrap everything else and home in on the evidence based results of the Navya Expert System, and the informatics that enables it, I knew that my system is in the hands of the right critiques and the perfect users who will use it to empower their patients.  When I was reminded that it is the Navya Evidence Engine that is the heart and core of what an expert desires, I was reassured, reaffirmed, reignited to remain focused on what we set out to do:  use evidence to make treatment decisions that are uniquely applicable to an individual patient.

Thank you, Dr. G and Dr. B for your constant push and faith in evidence based expert decision making; and for the opportunity, the privilege, to build Navya with you.

 

Unstructured data versus structured data – what is better for clinical decision making, in cancer?

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A lot of talk has been ongoing on unstructured data – as in this Facebook note, your blog post, a patient’s question on a support group, a doctor’s response on a newsgroup, a PDF scan copy of your aunt’s prescription, a journal article, its rebuttal, and you get the idea. There clearly is a lot of information pertaining to health and it may be an overkill, when it comes to decision making. Ask a cancer expert. They trust raw data, primary data from clinical trials that are high quality, randomized control. They trust their own experience treating large volumes of patients firsthand, observing the toxicities and managing the comorbidities (other health conditions like a weak heart or compromised liver) that may complicate a cancer treatment. And ultimately, data is only valuable when it is credible and lends itself to crisp, crystal clear, decision making: i.e. 1) sources of data matter (a randomized controlled clinical trial versus many doctors’ notes… or outcomes of patients at an expert cancer center versus self reported comments by patients on an online forum), and 2) structuring data in a way that doctors think from the get go, allows valuable information to be retrieved for decision making.

Hence, I am a fan of structuring data, which in and of itself is a complex challenge (Navya has developed an ontology for decision making, cancer by cancer, and that ontology is derived from the credible sources of data itself – like clinical trials and international guidelines and the handful of true experts themselves), rather than spinning cycles (computational power, manual processes, resources in time and money), on parsing mountains and mountains of any and all health related data and then trying very hard to derive accurate, usable, precise meaning from it for clinical decision making.

When it comes to cancer care, start with structured credible data and focus (spin wheels if you must) on analyzing it for decision making.