Oncologists to discuss treatment of blood cancer in elderly

Top oncologists are meeting in Rome today to discuss the treatment of blood cancer in the elderly, with the aim of driving widespread change to ensure equality of care for everyone, whatever their chronological age.

Europe's largest geriatric oncology meeting, Blood Cancer in the Elderly European Expert Forum, is part of an initiative by ecancer, open access journal of the European Institute of Oncology.

The meeting brings together for the first time an eminent European Steering Committee, a well-recognised faculty of speakers and over 1,000 physicians to learn, share and explore current thinking and treatment in elderly patients with haematological malignancies. 

Elderly patients are currently under-treated in everyday clinical practice and under-represented in clinical trials. Both clinical and policy shifts are being discussed to tackle this problem as well as myelodysplasia, anaemia, toxicities, co-morbidities and individualized management.

Prof Gordon McVie, Managing Editor of ecancer, said "My team and I believe this valuable patient group are too often being undertreated and offered suboptimal therapies. Survival rates have dramatically improved in younger patients with the development of newer, more efficacious, less toxic agents. These treatments offer the opportunity to treat all categories of elderly patients with haematological malignancies and improve their survival too.

With over 50% of newly diagnosed cancers occurring in the over sixty-fives and the percentage of this population steadily increasing, we have a real challenge to improve this situation. The inaugural Blood Cancer in the Elderly European Expert Forum is the prime educational meeting in this area, delivering evidence-based information sessions and debates on the topic 'Age and Comorbidity in Haematological Cancers'."