How CVS Health Uses NCCN Guidelines to Advance Precision Medicine

Organizations are constantly looking for ways to enhance treatment and patient experience. By incorporating National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) guidelines and precision medicine, CVS Health is working to improve cancer patient outcomes and lower costs.

The National Comprehensive Cancer Network’s (NCCN) clinical guidelines cover 97 percent of all cancers prevalent in the U.S. Based on the latest clinical evidence and trial results, these guidelines enhance safety by enabling evidence-based personalized patient care, reducing medication errors and anticipating and managing adverse events and are considered the gold standard for cancer treatments. They are continuously updated as more research emerges.

At CVS Health, the organization has leveraged NCCN guidelines updated in real-time in its oncology platform as part of its Transform Oncology Care program.

“Oncology treatment regimens often include multiple drugs. By directly integrating the NCCN guidelines into our approval process, guarantees patients are getting on the most appropriate treatments for their specific diagnosis and the entire therapy regimen can be approved at the same time,” Divisional Head of Enterprise Oncology at CVS Health Roger Brito, DO, told HealthITAnalytics.

“What we’ve learned is when there’s alignment with the NCCN guidelines from oncology, this also translated to cost savings cause they’re choosing the best combination of therapies for each patient’s exact diagnosis.”

Precision medicine and gene sequencing, can further enhance care by helping providers choose the right treatments based on the patient’s clinical profile.

“Broad-panel gene sequencing means providers have the exact profile of the individual patient’s tumor or cancer. This is personalized medicine and precision medicine at its best,” Brito explained.

By incorporating precision medicine and continuing to align with NCCN guidelines, providers can enhance targeted treatments for cancer and tumors, producing better patient outcomes and improving the care journey.  

“As we learn more about the biology of a patient’s specific cancer, or just the biology of cancer in general, being able to give an oncologist kind of a genomic landscape of their patient’s tumor is critical to treatment,” Brito said.

When a patient is diagnosed with cancer, Brito says the impact is multi-faceted – what oncologists call the triple toxicity of cancer.

“It’s not only the physical potential side effects from the disease, but also the treatments and some of their side effects that leads to physical toxicity effect. Also, treatments are expensive meaning there is financial toxicity,” Brito explained.

“Frequently, patients must go into their pockets to pay for some of the costs, and it may inhibit them from working and contributing to their family units. That spills over to the family and leads to the third toxicity, which is a psychosocial or mental toxicity or cancer.”

According to Brito, by following the NCCN guidelines, CVS Health’s patient-centric oncology care program can significantly improve a patient’s journey.

“By incorporating the guidelines into our provider platform we enable oncologists to select the best regimens – and get them approved in a very timely manner. Therefore, the patients are getting the treatments at the right time. Expediting the time to treating the patient is really important and impactful,” Brito said.

CVS Health’s value-based arrangements supply oncology providers with tools and technology to select the appropriate regimens to impact patient care. Once the treatments have been delivered, trained clinicians can offer ongoing, holistic care management .

Patients and their families can use digital tools such as secure messaging to alert their care team of any unexpected side effects, meaning any problems are addressed early on and can help prevent ER or hospital admission. They can use apps and wearables to track their symptoms and share that information with their care team as well.

“We can make that patient’s journey a little bit better so that patients can actually get their treatment and go back into the workforce. Their family members also feel more comfortable that they’re not having a lot of these side effects at home to where they sometimes feel helpless,” Brito said.