For our upcoming lung cancer tweetchat (hashtag #lcsm) on Thursday, August 22nd at 8 PM Eastern, 5 PM Pacific, we're going to be covering the important topic of costs of cancer drugs and procedures, how that's affecting patient care, whether pricing is fair, and whether there is a sense of value in the drugs and treatments being offered.

Dr. Mary Pinder of Moffitt Cancer Center reviews the CUSTOM trial, in which the study of molecular markers was expanded to patients with small cell lung cancer and thymic carcinomas.

[powerpress]

This is the first video in our series from a program filmed directly from ASCO 2013. Drs. Nate Pennell, Mary Pinder, and Jack West discuss the Biomarkers France trial of testing on a national scale for clinically relevant biomarkers in advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

[powerpress]

>> Discuss this GRACEcast Video in the GRACE Discussion Forums

Drs. Nate Pennell, Mary Pinder, and Jack West discuss the Biomarkers France trial of testing on a national scale for clinically relevant biomarkers in advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

[powerpress]

Dr. David Spigel, Sarah Cannon Cancer Center, reviews which patients with lung cancer he feels should undergo molecular testing, as well as describing the potential value of immediate, reflex testing for molecular targets.

[powerpress]

Dr. Lecia Sequist provides her thoughts on how molecular oncology can soon begin affecting treatment plans for a broader range of patients with lung cancer, including those with squamous NSCLC and other lung cancer histologies.

[powerpress]

Dr. Alan Sandler, Oregon Health and Science University, describes how he sees very specialized molecular testing for lung cancer becoming increasingly available to oncologists seeing patients in the community setting.

[powerpress]

Dr. Bob Doebele from the University of Colorado offers his perspective on whether targeted therapies will be able to applied to broader populations of patients with advanced NSCLC than those primarily with minimal smoking histories and an adenocarcinoma.

[powerpress]

Folks here know that just about every day we discuss questions of what molecular marker test to order for lung cancer, how important it is, how it's done, what tissue is needed, and other very timely and practical issues in lung cancer.  These are questions that evolve every few months, as new research emerges with different markers.  

This is the last of six podcasts produced from the two hour program we did in partnership with the LUNGevity Foundation earlier this year in Santa Monica, at the start of the "Targeted Therapies in Lung Cancer" annual meeting.  This activity was comprised of some great panel discussions and brief presentations on tough but timely issues on the subject of "Molecular Markers in Advanced NSCLC: Who to Test and What to Test For?".  It featured guest faculty members Dr. Charlie Rudin from Johns Hopkins University, Dr. Alice Shaw from Massachusetts General Hospital, Dr.