Dr David Eagle on Celebrating 20 Years of COA at This Year’s Meeting

Exciting happenings at the upcoming Community Oncology Conference include the attendance of several past presidents of the Community Oncology Alliance (COA), as well as sessions on the Enhancing Oncology Model and pharmacy benefit managers, according to David Eagle, MD, chair of legislative affairs and patient advocacy at New York Cancer & Blood Specialists, COA executive committee member, and past COA president.

Transcript

What speakers and sessions have you excited to attend this year’s Community Oncology Conference?

I’m excited that COA has now turned 20 years old. I think a new oncology organization gets born about once every generation, and so we’re proud that we’ve been around for 20 years now. We’ve got a few of the past presidents coming in for the event.

I am excited about the Enhancing Oncology Model sessions, because I think as we get to March, there’s going to be a lot of tension in terms of where we are with practices deciding whether to enroll in the Enhancing Oncology Model. I think we’re kind of in a tricky time for that. We’ll be figuring out very soon thereafter whether it makes sense for a practice to enroll.

I’m looking forward to the sessions on pharmacy benefit managers as well. That’s certainly an area that affects patients and practices as well—along with the future of oncology, which, honestly, I don’t know the answer to, so I’m looking forward to hearing about what the future of oncology is going to be.