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Continuing with our series of various unbranded offerings provided by pharmaceuticals and other companies that provide diagnostics and treatments for cancer patients, this list below comes from Merck.

Coordinating care; overcoming patient, provider, and health system barriers; and reducing delays across the care continuum have been long-standing challenges for healthcare managers.

Most navigators are familiar with the large national patient advocacy organizations that provide various resources for patients that can expedite our ability to reduce barriers impeding diagnosis and treatment, but there are actually additional resources that you may not be aware of that I want to tell you about. These resources are from pharmaceutical companies and other device and laboratory testing companies.

The American Cancer Society reports that lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death for both men and women and that more people die each year from lung cancer than from cancer of the colon, breast, and prostate combined.

Elizabeth Whitley, PhD, RN, who presented “Leading and Administering a Patient Navigation Program” with Bonnie Miller, RN, BSN, OCN, FAAMA, reminded participants that patient navigators are not necessarily nurses but can include other health personnel.

We recognize that a diagnosis of cancer can be a life-changing event, with the journey from diagnosis to survivorship, and perhaps to end-of-life care, filled with fear, challenges, and uncertainties.

Patient navigation emerged 2 decades ago, with numerous articles reporting cancer care outcomes from the patient perspective, but its effect on improving organizational outcomes requires further research.

As healthcare professionals who work with people living with cancer, we often see patients when they are most vulnerable.

The American Cancer Society estimates that over 1.6 million new cases of cancer will be diagnosed in the United States in 2012.

Boston Medical Center (BMC) is a private, not-for-profit academic medical center and the primary teaching affiliate for Boston University School of Medicine.