NCCS Submits Comments in Follow-Up to FDA Patient-Focused Public Meeting

NCCS submitted comments to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as a follow-up to the Lung Cancer Patient-Focused Drug Development public meeting on June 28, 2013. The patient-focused drug development program is an initiative mandated by the Food and Drug Administration Safety and Innovation Act (FDASIA) and is intended to provide the agency the advice of patients regarding the risks and benefits of new cancer drugs as well as the perspective of patients regarding unmet medical need. In its comments, NCCS offered additional perspectives on the symptoms and side effects encountered during late stages of the disease, research on the prevalence and characteristics individuals who received no anticancer therapy for their Stage IV solid tumors, the need for treatments where the benefits in terms of quantity and quality of life outweigh the significant side effects of treatment, and the importance of molecular testing to identify the most promising treatment options.