Lack of Access Can Lock Patients in “Disease of Despair”

Founder of the Melanoma Patient Network Europe (MPNE), Dr. Bettina Ryll contributed the patient perspective to the session Immuno-Oncology: Therapeutic Breakthrough Area or Nightmare for Health Care Funding at DIA’s first BioVenture Day in Europe. In this exclusive Global Forum podcast, Dr. Ryll shares the challenges to patient-centric drug development and patient access to those drugs in Europe. “Melanoma as a disease has completely changed. We’ve moved from one with no hope, a disease full of despair where patients had a median survival of six to nine months after being diagnosed, to one where all of a sudden we have survivors and we’re discussing the possibility of a cure!” she explains. “This is how we as the MPNE got interested in the process of innovation: How do we get to these new therapies? Now, in the next step, how do we actually make them accessible for our patients? Because a drug that is just sitting on a shelf that we cannot access is as good as non-existent for patients.” Learn more by attending Challenges and Issues in Early-Phase Oncology Trials, Evolution of Novel Registration Endpoints as Diseases Become Chronic and other sessions at our DIA 2017 Global Annual Meeting.