Lynn Boon

Brent Coon and Associates

Date: 1/27/2005

Duration: 8:43

Dr. David Sugarbaker sits down with Motley Rice's Lynn Boon to discuss his groundbreaking treatments for those suffering from mesothelioma.

Video Transcript

Announcer: Dr. David Sugarbaker, Chief Physician at the Division of Thoracic Surgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, sits down with Motley Rise and Lynn Boone to discuss his groundbreaking treatment for those suffering from mesothelioma.

Lynn Boone: all right, Dr. Sugarbaker, if you would, please tell us generally about the work you do with mesothelioma patient.

Dr. David Sugarbaker: We're interested in dealing with patients who've been stricken with mesothelioma. And, what we try to provide is an aggressive approach where that is possible, and many times this involves surgery, with chemotherapy at the time of surgery, followed by then chemotherapy and other treatments that we can arrange to have for the patient back in their hometown.

So, the idea is to provide a comprehensive evaluation, provide the options, lay them out one after the other for the patient and their families, and then give them information and help them make a decision as to what treatment would be best for them. Most of all to let them know up front that there is hope and that there is treatment for mesothelioma, because many patients, Lynn, come in and don't have the idea that there is treatment available and that their disease, mesothelioma, is treatable, and that they can live longer than what they had thought they could when they came in.

Lynn: Are there other doctors out there performing this treatment?

David: Yes, there are other physicians around the county in several areas, I would say, again, another thing we'd like to inform patients of is that, if you have mesothelioma, this is a time when you need to look around and find out what the two or three centers are in the country that are doing specifically clinical trials in mesothelioma, have some track record in the disease, and get yourself and your family there for a day for an evaluation. It's very important that they realize that this is a relatively rare problem; about 3,000 new cases in a year in the United States, that's very rare compared to lung cancer where there's 180,000 cases. So the expertise to treat you if you have this problem may not be in your hometown, it may not be in your home state. That's OK, because there are places that can offer you care as we can in Boston.

Lynn: Well, what's going to be a concern to everyone is the cost; so is this a costly procedure?

David: The cost is usually covered by your own insurance, whatever it happens to be. Most of the health maintenance HMO, other insurance products that are out there, will cover specialized treatments for a specialized problem like mesothelioma, and they'll cover it in Boston. I think that this time in fifteen years I've never had a patient with a US insurance coverage of any type that wouldn't pay for their treatment.

Lynn: OK, great. Thanks. Who would you determine to be a good candidate, a good patient for this treatment?

David: Well, there is, sort of the idea that you have to be young, and that you have to be maybe an athlete or something to have this sort of treatment. But, I just got off the phone a few moments ago with a 79-year-old woman who's done beautifully. Patients really are candidates based on their physical physiologic age. And many patients who would be in their mid 70's late 70's really from our standpoint are in their mid 60's. And all of those patients can be evaluated and again we will tell you there is all sorts of treatment strategies that go from the most aggressive to those that are less aggressive, where even the older patient with the disease can get treatment and some of those patients are alive several years, three, four, five years later. So, you can't tell.

Lynn: Wonderful. You know, this all sounds wonderful and there are those who have called your achievements groundbreaking. Are there any other advances that you can think of out there in the future?

David: Well, part of the problem with mesothelioma through the years has been 3,000 cases across 50 states. Most doctors see one case in their lifetime or maybe two in their professional lifetime. So we haven't been able to get an understanding as to how the disease acts. But, over the last 15 years, we have steadily moved through one strategy, learning where that strategy fails, ultimately, and then building a second strategy that takes into account that information, so we begin to build, in a stair-step way on the previous experience. And so, I think that the, probably the most important advance we're going to make is the movement of biologic therapy, enzyme inhibitors, other things like that, combining with the surgery that removes all the disease that you can see, putting those two together I think, may actually get us much closer to the cure that is the fundamental goal of what we're doing.

Lynn: OK. Getting to the cure, great. Do you have an active research program in addition to your treatment program?

David: Yes, we have a very active research program. And when I say research program, I mean there are five laboratories at the Harvard Medical School, spread amongst the different institutions, the Harvard School of Public Health, the Brigham And Women's Hospital, the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, and the Mass General Hospital, all of whom have individuals that are now part of a program, a program that exchanges information, that coordinates their research so that we have the clinical program that constantly is receiving information, Lynn, from these laboratories, so that we can implement new clinical treatments as quickly as the scientists can give us the new data suggesting that they have a new bullet in our gun against this deadly disease.

Lynn: Do you find it important to partner with someone so the attorneys can be better educated about the disease and its latest treatment?

David: You know the interesting thing is, Lynn, is that I find that many attorneys and certainly my experience with Motley Rise has been that the attorneys understand the disease, its progression, its instigating factors far better than many physicians that I talk with, simply because of their dogged investigation of every case. And that information is, I think, information that still hasn't made its way to the medical side of the evaluation of this disease. So this partnership between the professionals at Motley Rise and the group at the Harvard Medical School is going, I think, to bring forth new information and a new understanding of the disease that is bound to lead to advances in the treatment, which is why we're all here.

Lynn: Great. I have one other question for you, and that is what other things do you think that doctors and lawyers can do together to better serve these patients and their families?

David: Many times patients will go directly to their, to an attorney, to try to provide for their family after they've been taken by the disease. I think informing those in the legal profession that are interested and dedicated to this problem is vital because, many times, it's their attorney that can say, hey wait a minute I had another client who's still alive four years later who sought aggressive treatment. So I think it's very important for the patients and for the clients being, of course, the same person, and their families to explore the broad range which includes medical treatment and of course their attempt and ability to get some compensation for the family and for themselves.

Lynn: Well thank you Dr. Sugarbaker. We certainly appreciate you taking your time in speaking with us here. Thank you so much.

David: You're very welcome. It's my privilege to be here. Thank you.