New Small-Group CE Opportunities Offer Personalized Virtual Learning

ACCC is offering two new online continuing education (CE) initiatives that leverage small-group learning among clinicians and their peers who have roles in the care and treatment of patients with early-stage NSCLC and patients with advanced HER2+ breast cancer. The small-group courses—limited to 6-15 people—engage learners in both self-paced self-study and collaborative online group tasks aimed at helping participants learn how to optimally manage their patients.

Leading this educational initiative are group leaders who are physicians, advanced practice providers (NPs/PAs), and oncology pharmacists with expertise in NSCLC and HER2+ breast cancer. Participants complete a multi-component curriculum that includes self-study materials, live group discussions, and group challenges. Group leaders focus on mentoring and promoting peer-to-peer learning to establish meaningful, small-group interactions that bring context to the material in the self-study units.

Best Practices in Early-Stage NSCLC

Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is the most common type of lung cancer, accounting for approximately 85 percent of all cases. The current standard of care for operable patients diagnosed in the early stages of NSCLC is curative surgery followed by adjuvant chemotherapy. However, more than half of these patients experience recurrence and will develop metastatic disease. To address this, several emerging therapies are being investigated for use in patients with early-stage NSCLC for their effectiveness in delaying disease progression following surgery.

In the evolving treatment landscape for patients with NSCLC, it is important for clinicians to gain a full understanding of optimal treatment selection and sequencing strategies, the integration of new therapies into practice, and the consensus-aligned management of treatment-related adverse events.

In this course, participants who have roles in the care and treatment of patients with early-stage NSCLC will:

• Discuss emerging data from ongoing studies of targeted therapies in the adjuvant setting for early-stage NSCLC
• Review recent clinical data from emerging studies of immunotherapy with checkpoint inhibitors in the neoadjuvant and adjuvant/consolidation setting to optimize survival for patients with early-stage NSCLC
• Assess the role of biomarkers in treatment selection for early-stage NSCLC
• Implement strategies to improve care coordination within the interprofessional cancer care team to improve patient outcomes in early-stage NSCLC

Making Sense of the Evolving Standards of Care for Advanced HER2+ Breast Cancer

Optimally treating patients with advanced HER2+ breast cancer requires navigating an ever-changing landscape of diagnostics and treatment options. As the number of these therapies increases, so too does the challenge for providers to keep current on the latest clinical advances.

For example, although first-line therapy with anti-HER2 targeted agents have significantly improved outcomes for patients with HER2+ breast cancer, most of these patients eventually relapse. To counter this, several novel therapies have recently become available for patients who have progressed following first-line and second-line anti-HER2 targeted therapies.

But while these therapies have unarguably improved outcomes, they also require providers to closely monitor and manage potential treatment-related adverse events. Because many community practitioners treat a wide range of tumor types, they often find it challenging to stay up to date with recent safety and efficacy data for targeted therapies.

In this course, participants who have roles in the care and treatment of patients with advanced HER2+ breast cancer will:

• Optimize outcomes for patients with HER2+ breast cancer who have received prior treatment with anti-HER2 targeted therapies
• Examine solutions for improving care coordination within the interprofessional cancer care team to monitor and manage treatment-related adverse events in patients with HER2+ breast cancer receiving novel targeted therapies
• Review strategies to improve treatment adherence in HER2+ metastatic breast cancer by engaging patients in shared decision-making

Join a Small Group

Both the early-stage NSCLC and advanced HER2+ breast cancer courses require a time commitment of 2.5 hours and offer CE credit upon completion. Enroll in Best Practices in Early-Stage NSCLC and Making Sense of the Evolving Standards of Care for Advanced HER2+ Breast Cancer by Nov. 8, 2021, to participate. If you would like to learn more about participating or serving as a group leader, please contact Rukiya Wongus, ACCC Program Manager.