Tumors, Oncologist Ghia: “With New Therapies We Can Better Control Blood Neoplasms”

“For 10-15 years, thanks to therapeutic innovation and the availability of treatments for hematological neoplasmswe are able to prolong the control of the disease for a long period of time, guaranteeing the patient a better quality of life and a life expectancy that in some cases is similar to healthy individuals. Blood diseases, especially onco-hematological diseases, are an example of how research can and must be transformed into benefits for patients with new therapies”. This was stated by Paolo Ghia, professor of Medical Oncology at the Vita-Salute San Raffaele University in Milan, director of the Strategic Program on Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia at the IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele in Milan and co-chair of the Gimema Working Party Chronic Lymphoproliferative Syndromes, speaking at the presentation – today in Rome – of the campaign #SavingTime, Lilly’s first initiative in the area of ​​hematological tumors.

“Living with the disease, even though a definitive cure has not yet been achieved, is therefore a concrete prospect for an ever-increasing number of patients – assures Ghia – In some cases, with the new therapies available, we are able to obtain complete healing, the disease does not return, especially if it is an aggressive, more acute pathology. In the cases of chronic diseases, however, we are still able to obtain long-term control of the same, with a life expectancy of patients sometimes identical to that of people not affected by a blood cancer disease. However, we are not able to completely eradicate the disease. For this reason, more research is still needed”.

Although the diagnosis of a blood tumor is no longer a death sentence as it used to be, it still has a strong impact on patients and their families. “The identification of specific therapies has allowed us to obtain astonishing results also in terms of patients’ quality of life, which has improved enormously because we have progressively moved from chemotherapy to biological therapies that can be taken orally. No infusions, no needles in the vein, but much better tolerated drugs, which act more specifically on certain mechanisms of the disease”, he concludes.