Clinical Trials Represent the Pinnacle of Medicine

Dr. Roy Jensen: Director, The University of Kansas Cancer Center
Director, Kansas Masonic Cancer Research Institute

I think clinical trials really represent the pinnacle of medicine. And the way that you go about designing a trial, implementing a trial, you know the first step is to determine what is the standard of care for this particular condition. And that is option one.

You’re basically guaranteed that you are going to have the best thinking up until this point helping to design and influence your care. So that’s the first thing.

The second thing is that we’re nowhere near where we need to be in terms of the efficacy of our care and what we’re doing for brain cancer patients in particular.

It is a tough, tough diagnosis with a really hard road of hope. If we’re going to make progress, then we have to treat everybody according to the best possible care that we know and then try something new.

If we keep trying the same approach over and over we’re never going to make any progress.

Clinical trials are all about the possibility of us making progress. And while the ultimate prognosis remains very tough we have made progress. Radiation therapy has evolved. The introduction of Temozolomide has significantly extended life. We have made huge strides in terms of supportive care to improve the quality of life for individuals diagnosed with brain cancer.

And all of that was made possible by clinical trials.