Mass. General Brigham praises cancer institute amid Dana-Farber divorce

The institute will not become a free-standing hospital. But it will for the first time combine the expertise and resources of MGB’s two flagship hospitals, Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham, whose cancer operations were previously separated by a firewall due to the latter’s partnership with Dana-Farber.

“What really started as a disruptive event a year ago, that Dana-Farber will be leaving after a few years, has now become a new opportunity for us to rethink the way we deliver care,” said Dr. O’Neil Britton, Head of Integration. officer for MGB, said Monday during a roundtable discussion at Massachusetts General Hospital with reporters.

Although other health care systems have opened freestanding cancer hospitals, including Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York and the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Texas, Britton and other MGB leaders argue that cancer patients do better if they are treated in a general hospital with easy access to a wide range of healthcare systems. range of specialists.

Many cancer patients, they say, had serious or life-threatening illnesses before they were diagnosed with cancer, and many cancer survivors live long enough to develop chronic diseases. In addition, cancer treatments can lead to side effects that require the expertise of other specialists.

Dr. David Ryan, the chief physician at Mass General Brigham Cancer and an expert in gastrointestinal cancer, said, “It is not uncommon to have 20 to 30 different teams of individuals involved in the care” of his patients. In one recent op-ed that he co-wrote in the Globe, he said, “the future of cancer care must treat the whole person.”

Dr. Benjamin L. Ebert, who met Dr. Laurie H. Glimcher as CEO of Dana-Farber, after she resignedrecently said his hospital has always deployed a range of non-oncology specialists to help treat patients with cancer.

“That is fundamental to the way Dana-Farber provides patient care,” said Ebert, who led the institute’s medical oncology division before succeeding Glimcher. “Sidney Farber coined the term ‘total patient care.’ This model was revolutionary when he proposed it.”

Farber was a pioneering pediatric pathologist who is considered the father of modern chemotherapy. He was active in advocacy and fundraising for cancer research and founded the Jimmy Fund. Dana-Farber is named after him.

David E. Williams, president of the Boston consulting firm Health Business Group, said both MGB and Dana-Farber can make compelling arguments for why their approaches are best. MGB, he said, says it cares for patients for a wide range of diseases from cradle to grave.

“The counterargument, if I had cancer, is, ‘I don’t care if I get arthritis in 20 years.’ I have to kill this cancer before it kills me,” he said.

During a second panel discussion at Massachusetts General on Monday, five specialists in neurology, gastroenterology, kidney disease and other diseases said it is easy for them to combine their skills to treat cancer patients and that it improves care.

They even introduced a patient they believe would benefit from this specialty collaboration: a retired oncology nurse from Lynn who worked at Dana-Farber for 32 years.

Larry Traiman said he was diagnosed with lung cancer in early 2023, even though he never smoked. He underwent chemotherapy and radiation at MGB’s satellite clinic in Danvers and thought he had beaten the disease, but the disease spread to his brain.

He then underwent chemotherapy and immunotherapy, but suffered serious complications and was hospitalized at Massachusetts General in Boston for five weeks earlier this year. Although he still has small cancerous lesions in his brain, he said, they have not caused significant neurological problems.

Traiman said he has seen a wide range of specialists at Massachusetts General, including oncologists, cardiologists, immunologists and neurologists.

“It’s not like the Farber hasn’t put that into practice,” said Traiman, who retired from the institute nine years ago. “But they weren’t all under one roof and it didn’t happen as quickly and efficiently. Under one roof, like at Mass. General, it was like, boom, it just happened faster.

During his tour before reporters Monday, MGB also touted its medical equipment as a draw for cancer patients, including New England’s only two proton radiation therapy centers, both located at Massachusetts General. Proton beam therapy delivers radiation to eliminate tumor cells, delivering less collateral radiation to surrounding normal cells and tissue. Each of the machines costs tens of millions of dollars.

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Jonathan Saltzman can be reached at [email protected].