Diaceutics helps raise awareness of the need for better diagnostic testing in the editorial “It’s all about diagnostics, stupid!” published in the March 2019 issue of Precision Cancer Medicine (PCM) accessible here.1 The editorial reflects Diaceutics’ perspective through the lens of its non-profit organization, Precision Medicine (PM) Connective, which was created to improve diagnostic testing and benefit patients.
The patient journey, from initial symptom to appropriate diagnosis, is all too often populated with inappropriate testing and subsequent diagnostic errors, delaying the start of appropriate treatment for months to potentially years. Limited availability of and access to diagnostic tests contributes to those diagnostic errors,2 which are quite commonplace. According to diagnostic patient journey research, most patients can expect to endure at least one diagnostic error throughout their lives.3 In 2016, the World Health Organization (WHO) recognized diagnostic errors as a priority patient safety concern in primary care.2 The WHO recommended improving patient access to high-quality diagnostic testing services (eg, radiology/laboratory) in the primary care setting.
In the Precision Cancer Medicine editorial, Diaceutics contributes to the ongoing dialogue on improving diagnostic testing practices. Specifically, Diaceutics presents an argument to further repair the “broken testing ecosystem” through patient empowerment and broader access to diagnostic tests in an effort to ultimately improve patient health outcomes.1
Diaceutics is an industry leading data analytics and implementation services provider to the pharmaceutical industry, focused on diagnostic commercialization and the intersection between diagnostics and therapeutic decision-making. In addition to the PM Connective, Diaceutics advocates for patients through international partnerships, including sponsoring World Cancer Day with the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC). The UICC’s “Treatment for All” campaign is based on four essential pillars of cancer treatment and care, including increasing the number of people with access to early detection and accurate cancer diagnosis.4
The editorial, written by Piarella Peralta, Associate Director of Patient Advocacy at PM Connective, can be accessed here.
References
- Peralta P. It’s all about diagnostics, stupid! Precis Cancer Med. 2019;2:6. http://pcm.amegroups.com/article/view/4921/html. Accessed March 13, 2019.
- Diagnostic errors: technical series on safer primary care. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2016. https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/252410/9789241511636-eng.pdf;jsessionid=B7EFB45EFC66E43C1E652CFB394CC3B3?sequence=1. Accessed March 8, 2019.
- National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2015. Improving diagnosis in health care. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. http://www.nationalacademies.org/hmd/Reports/2015/Improving-Diagnosis-in-Healthcare. Updated October 19, 2019. Accessed March 8, 2019.
- Treatment for all. Union for International Cancer Control Web site. https://www.uicc.org/what-we-do/advocacy/treatment-all. Updated February 11, 2019. Accessed March 13, 2019.