ReviewBritish journal of cancer2021
An urgent call to raise the bar in oncology.
Review in British journal of cancer, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 36 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
36 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 58 citations in OpenAlex.
- Association Between Survival Benefits of Anticancer Drugs and Probability of US Food and Drug Administration Approval: A Systematic Review.Pharmaceutical medicine · 2026Pooled it
- Transforming Brain Tumor Care: The Global Impact of Radiosurgery in Multidisciplinary Treatment Over Two Decades.Cancer medicine · 2025Pooled it
- Overall Survival Benefits of Cancer Drugs Approved in China From 2005 to 2020.JAMA network open · 2022Pooled it
- A decade comparison of regulatory decision patterns for oncology products to all other non-oncology products among Swissmedic, European Medicines Agency, and US Food and Drug Administration.Clinical and translational science · 2023Trial
- Patient Understanding of Oncology Clinical Trial Endpoints in Direct-to-Consumer Television Advertising.The oncologist · 2023Trial
- Navigating the Prescription Drug Information System.Clinical pharmacology and therapeutics · 2026Review
- Review
- Uncertain magnitude of benefit of early second-generation androgen receptor antagonist treatment in advanced prostate cancer.Oncology reviews · 2026Review
- FDA first to global follow-on: alignment in expedited oncology approvals across EMA, TGA, and PMDA.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2026Article
- Global mechanisms to improve affordability of high-priced medicines: the role of the WHO model lists of essential medicines.Journal of pharmaceutical policy and practice · 2026Article
- The Fortunes of Genomic Medicine: A Quarter Century of Promise.Annals of human genetics · 2025Article
- Revitalizing oncology medications access in Saudi Arabia: Current challenges and recommendations by the Saudi Oncology Pharmacy Assembly.Journal of oncology pharmacy practice : official publication of the International Society of Oncology Pharmacy Practitioners · 2025Article
- Review
- Increasing the focus on critical appraisal of trials and financial conflict of interest in medical training programs: a perspective from oncology.Frontiers in medicine · 2025Article
- Evidence of clinical benefit of cancer medicines considered for funding in Australia.International journal of technology assessment in health care · 2024Article
- Clinically meaningful outcomes in refractory metastatic colorectal cancer: a decade of defining and raising the bar.ESMO open · 2024Review
- Review
- Analyses of quality of life in cancer drug trials - a review of measurements and analytical choices in post-reimbursement studies.BMC cancer · 2024Review
- Assessment of quality of data submitted for NICE technology appraisals over two decades.BMJ open · 2024Article
- The NeuroPoint alliance SRS & tumor QOD registries.Journal of neuro-oncology · 2024Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Important breakthroughs in medical treatments have improved outcomes for patients suffering from several types of cancer. However, many oncological treatments approved by regulatory agencies are of low value and do not contribute significantly to cancer mortality reduction, but lead to unrealistic patient expectations and push even affluent societies to unsustainable health care costs. Several factors that contribute to approvals of low-value oncology treatments are addressed, including issues with clinical trials, bias in reporting, regulatory agency shortcomings and drug pricing. With the COVID-19 pandemic enforcing the elimination of low-value interventions in all fields of medicine, efforts should urgently be made by all involved in cancer care to select only high-value and sustainable interventions. Transformation of medical education, improvement in clinical trial design, quality, conduct and reporting, strict adherence to scientific norms by regulatory agencies and use of value-based scales can all contribute to raising the bar for oncology drug approvals and influence drug pricing and availability.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.