medwireNews: New patient guidelines from the US National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) aim to help cancer patients and their caregivers identify the side effects of immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) treatment.
“These NCCN Guidelines for Patients are designed to educate patients and to help them recognize immune side effects so that effective interventions can be started promptly,” commented panel chair John Thompson (Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, Washington, USA) in a press release.
The guidance, which draws on the corresponding NCCN guidelines for physicians, includes detailed information on the different types of immune-related adverse events (irAEs), such as endocrine, skin, and musculoskeletal irAEs. Patients are also given information on the tests they may undergo and the possible treatments for the irAEs.
The document uses easy-to-understand language and includes patient-friendly illustrations, a glossary, and a list of possible questions about ICI therapy and associated side effects that patients can put to their physicians. An accompanying NCCN Quick Guide™ provides a summary of the key points from the full document, and both are available at no cost on the NCCN website.
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