Justin-E.-Bekelman,-MD-

Patient-powered proton study looks at long-term side effects

News of the RadComp Study’s enrollment completion was covered in Penn Medicine News last month. The article, “Patient-powered proton study looks at long-term side effects”, explains the hypotheses of the Study and its potential benefits to the future of breast cancer treatment. It shines a spotlight on the contributions of breast cancer survivors in the Study’s design and execution. “We did this study because we knew this was an important problem that patients cared deeply about,” said Justin Bekelman, MD, the Marietta and Howard Stoeckel Professor at Penn Medicine, who designed and leads the RadComp trial.

For more, read the news story from Penn Medicine.

The Importance of Clinical Trial Participation

RadComp Stakeholder Advisory Committee member, Sharon Rivera-Sanchez, recently shared how participating in clinical trials inspired her to become a breast cancer advocate and start two non-profit organizations dedicated to supporting underserved cancer patients and bridging the gap between them, their providers, and clinical trials. In an article for BlackDoctor.org, Rivera-Sanchez outlined her treatment journey, and how clinical trials played an important role in her survival and in her founding of Saving Pennies 4 A Cure and Trials of Color. As Black patients make up only 5 percent of clinical trial participants despite them being disproportionately affected by cancer, she hopes that her story can inspire more Black patients to join clinical trials.

Read the Full Article

quality of life note

Quality of Life Questionnaires and the Vision Tree Tool

Quality of Life (QOL) questionnaire completion is a key component of the RadComp Trial. The QOLs ask about a participant’s physical, emotional, and social well-being before and after treatment. Participants are asked to complete QOLs at baseline, end of treatment, 1 month, 6 months, 12 months post-treatment and annually thereafter. QOL forms can be completed on paper, over the phone, or online via VisionTree (VTOC.)

VTOC is an excellent option for QOL completion and is strongly recommended. Participants will receive email reminders from the VTOC system when their QOLs are due and throughout their open time point window. Participants have the ability to complete the QOLs at their convenience and can start and stop at any time. The utilization of VTOC also reduces the burden on study staff. QOLs completed on VTOC are automatically pushed over to Rave so CRCs are not required to enter the data.

Below are a few reminders about VTOC:

  • Participants can opt-in to use VTOC at any time. If a participant would like to use VTOC after registration:
    1. A VTOC consent form must be emailed to the participant, signed, and returned to the enrolling site.
    2. The eligibility checklist in Rave must be updated to reflect the participant’s decision to use VTOC.
  • Active windows for VTOC QOLs are set to capture participants receiving 4-7 weeks of treatment; a standard window is applied to all participants regardless of the number of weeks a participant receives treatment.
  • Make sure the template start date in VTOC is the same as the participant’s start date for those receiving 4-5 weeks of treatment.
  • The template start date should be set to 1-2 weeks after the participant’s start date for those receiving 6-7 weeks of treatment.
  • Completion windows can be reset by selecting each individual QOL for a particular time point from the patient’s dashboard and changing the “active from” and “active to” date. Instructions are attached.
  • Baseline QOLs are the only questionnaires that must be completed on paper and must be completed prior to registration.

For questions about VTOC, please contact Ashley Feriozzi
(Ashley.feriozzi@pennmedicine.upenn.edu) or VTOC support (vtsupport@visiontree.com).