New research from the Netherlands Comprehensive Cancer Centre reveals a critical implementation gap in personalised cancer medicine. Despite policy reforms that removed financial barriers to gene expression testing, only one-third of eligible breast cancer patients receive the diagnostic tool that could spare them from unnecessary chemotherapy.
The study, published in the International Journal of Cancer and led by Prof. Sabine Siesling, demonstrates that reimbursement policy changes alone are insufficient to drive clinical practice change. Researchers identified three systemic barriers limiting adoption: inadequate clinician awareness of testing benefits, insufficient laboratory capacity, and gaps in clinical workflow integration.
These findings highlight a crucial lesson for healthcare systems: bridging the gap between policy enablement and clinical implementation requires coordinated efforts addressing education, infrastructure, and workflow redesign—not financial incentives alone.
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