Jan. 17, 2022

This paid piece is sponsored by Avera Health.

A cancer diagnosis is life-changing and comes with feelings of fear and uncertainty. It can be more of a struggle when patients must drive for hours to reach their care team.

With a service area of more than 72,000 square miles, Avera Cancer Institute wants to meet patient needs, wherever home might be. Getting care closer is one of the health system’s overarching goals and why it keeps adding technology, expert staff and new clinical approaches in many smaller communities, with more advances to come this year.

“We continue to improve our high-quality care through the cancer service line, which allows us to do innovative things like offering clinical trials even in rural areas,” said Dr. John Lee, chief medical officer of cancer research with Avera Cancer Institute. “We have new, important clinical trials underway, offer services like transplant that would otherwise require patients to leave the state for care, plus many partnerships with allies who can help us achieve our goals.”

Lee said Avera’s commitment to high-quality cancer care has resulted in network accreditations from both the American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer and American Society of Clinical Oncology Quality Oncology Practice Initiative. These accreditations not only verify quality and clinical excellence, but also an ongoing dedication to performance improvement, ultimately benefiting patient care.

Dr. Luis Rojas is an Avera Medical Group gynecologic oncologist and clinical vice president of the group’s oncology service line.

Avera Cancer Institute is one institute with six regional centers spanning across the Avera footprint in Sioux Falls, Aberdeen, Mitchell, Pierre, Yankton and Pierre and in Marshall, Minnesota, plus outreach care in 31 other communities.

The process already has positive results. Examples include:

• Avera’s Project Footprint is expanding clinical trials to more locations outside of Aberdeen and Sioux Falls, including Pierre trials that began in August 2020, with plans to expand trials to Yankton, Mitchell and Marshall.
• Systemwide quality meetings, which ensure approaches that work are implemented and evaluated among all cancer professionals.
• Collaboration with technology leaders such as Elekta for radiation oncology equipment and Sema4, a patient-centered health intelligence company helping Avera use patient data and genomic testing to precisely target cancer treatments.

“We continue to grow these relationships as they are vital to both patients and physicians,” Lee said. “We’re building platforms that allow us to try new treatment approaches. Clinical trials give our patients new access to treatments, which comes back to our goal of providing closer-to-home care that can save lives.”

A new online module for helping cancer patients find clinical trials is live at Avera.org/Cancer.

“It’s a pyramid we’re building, and the pieces include physicians and experts, technology and treatment services but also clinical trials,” Lee said. “Each piece helps the next one as we integrate our work.”

One example is the use of the body’s “natural killer cells” to work against tumors. One clinical trial found a dramatic increase in successful treatment using this method. Where traditional therapies had positive responses only 5 percent of the time, a new clinical trial approach was showing an 80 percent improvement in that area.

More than research and trials

The Avera Cancer Institute Navigation Center is a great example of how an integrated cancer care network can support patients and families. All cancer patients have questions at diagnosis – and beyond.

“Our navigation center RNs and social workers are available 24/7. They answer questions from patients who have symptoms or worries,” Lee said. “They also answer questions from physicians and loved ones, so that no one is in the dark on a case, a condition or a situation.”

Navigators can take calls and guide a patient, sometimes saving them a trip to an emergency room.

“We continue to add solutions every day,” Lee said. “We have new clinical trials, new physicians and new capabilities, and we’ll continue to grow this network carefully until we can achieve our goal of providing the best possible cancer care to every patient who needs it, as close to home as possible.”

To learn more visit Avera.org/Cancer.