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the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone
system. The most common treatment-related adverse events included
constipation, hypomagnesemia, diarrhea, nausea, abdominal discomfort,
and flatulence.
Patiromer carries a boxed warning because it binds many other orally administered drugs, which could
decrease their absorption and reduce
the effects. The warning recommends
taking patiromer and any other orally
administered medication at least six
hours apart.
Source: U.S. FDA press release, “FDA approves new drug to treat
hyperkalemia,” October 21, 2015.
NCCN Unveils New
Value Initiative,
Releases Clinical
Practice Guidelines
The National Comprehensive Cancer
Network (NCCN) recently unveiled
the NCCN Evidence Blocks™, a new
tool for evaluating treatment decisions that enables physicians and
patients to better understand cancer
treatments and values. This new
initiative will provide patients with
guidance about the cost of drugs,
in addition to treatment effectiveness, side effects, and evidence-based
regimens.
Published in a new version of
the NCCN Guidelines, the Evidence
Blocks are a visual representation of
five key value measures that provide
important information about specific
Guidelines recommendations:
• Efficacy of regimens
• Safety of regimens
• Quality and quantity of evidence
for regimens
• Consistency of evidence for
regimens
• Affordability of regimens
Previous guidelines from the NCCN
did not consider cost in treatment
recommendations, but the new
guidance accompanying the NCCN’s
Evidence Blocks will include an additional set of information doctors can
share with patients while discussing
treatment options.
The guidance will not include
actual treatment dollar figures or
account for how much is covered by
insurance, but instead will rank the
drugs on a scale of 1 to 5 for affordability. The affordability measurement represen