For cancer specialists in the Region, the latest five-year cancer survival rates confirm what they've been witnessing: More patients are living long-term thanks to advances in screening, targeted therapies and coordinated care.

Earlier this year, the American Cancer Society announced a turning point in oncology:

Five-year survival for all cancers has climbed to 70% for Americans diagnosed between 2015 and 2021.

"The field of oncology has had remarkable growth over the past few decades as we learn more about different types of cancer and how they operate," said Dr. Shuai Qin, a Franciscan Physician Network hematologist and oncologist in Munster. "Frequently, new discoveries are being made and new medications are being approved that have the potential to dramatically improve someone's clinical course."

The report highlights especially strong progress against cancers once considered among the most lethal. Since the mid-1990s, survival has roughly doubled for myeloma and increased significantly for liver and lung cancers, while the nation's cancer death rate has dropped by more than a third — with nearly 5 million deaths prevented since 1991.

Local cancer experts say the improvements in survival rates are being felt not just in outcomes, but also in access to advanced care without leaving the Region. Dr. Eduardo Braun, an oncologist and hematologist on staff at Powers Health, has practiced in the Region since 2013. As co-medical director of Powers Health Cancer Research, Braun says Northwest Indiana health-care systems are providing top levels of care close to home.

"The amount of progress the Region has made in treating cancer is really astonishing," he said.

Awareness and early detection

As a lung cancer oncologist with Rush Medical Group, Dr. Helen Ross says she has seen the five-year survival rates of patients diagnosed with lung cancer rise to 28%, up from just 5% in the 1990s and early 2000s.

Yet the face of lung cancer is also changing. Studies show nearly 20% of new lung cancer diagnoses are in young people who have never smoked, specifically women.

"Lung cancer ribbons are clear because it's an invisible disease with people sitting in the shadows still," Ross said. "Young women who have been diagnosed with lung cancer are still taking care of their parents and have kids to take care of, but they are taking the time to organize and speak out, so there's a lot more awareness."

That awareness leads to early detection, key for solid tumors such as breast, lung and colon cancers, Qin said.

"It often surprises people when I talk about curative treatments for cancers. But keep in mind, almost all solid tumors are curable if found at an earlier stage, when it is still small and has not had the chance to spread or affect other areas of the body," she said. "This is how mammograms and colonoscopies save lives."

Targeted therapy

A significant improvement in cancer care came in the form of precision medicine, which has included the introduction of targeted treatments for diseases such as breast cancer and chronic myeloid leukemia (CML), Qin says.

"This completely changed how we managed those conditions," she said. "It also led the way for multiple new drug approaches for many different cancer types."

Targeted treatments are often used in advance cancer management with health-care teams using the genetic makeup of the cancer itself to target specific or vulnerable points with treatment.

"This has allowed people to live longer and better with cancer," Qin said.

Braun said that staging alone is no longer sufficient when determining treatment plans for many diseases. Instead, physicians now rely on detailed molecular and genetic testing to identify key markers before selecting a therapy.

This growing understanding of cancer biology has enabled clinicians to target "driver mutations," the genetic alterations that fuel tumor growth, and to deploy newer generations of drugs designed to counter resistance, he said.

Antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) are another major development contributing to improvement in outcomes and quality of life, Braun said.

"Those are specifically designed antibodies that deliver chemotherapy directly into tumor cells," he said. "(They work) like a 'smart bomb' that uses homing devices to deliver potent chemotherapy directly to cancer cells, sparing tissue as much as possible."

Gene power

One of the most transformative advances in lung cancer treatment came with the discovery of EGFR genomic alterations, which affect a portion of patients whose cancer growth is driven by a permanently activated receptor on the cell surface, Ross said.

Researchers initially noticed that a small group of patients in early trials responded well to certain drugs, prompting further investigation that revealed the underlying driver mutation. By targeting and shutting down that altered growth signal, clinicians saw dramatic improvements, sometimes reversing severe symptoms within weeks and allowing patients to regain quality of life for extended periods.

"The first patient I ever treated with an EGFR inhibitor was in her 50s who never smoked and was progressively getting worse," Ross said. "When I first saw her, she was on a few liters of oxygen, and two weeks later, was up to six liters."

After she began her treatment, the patient returned to Ross a week later, walking.

"A month later, she was on a skiing trip," she said. "She lived a long time, a good quality of life."

A marathon, not a sprint

Cancer treatments often require ongoing evaluation and adjustment, since therapies that are effective at one point may become less so as the disease evolves, Braun said.

"It's not a sprint run — it's a marathon," he said.

That need for constant adaptation remains one of the ongoing challenges in pushing survival rates even higher, as cancer's ability to change can complicate long-term disease control.

Disparities in cancer care remain another major concern, with organizations including the American Cancer Society and American Society of Clinical Oncology working to identify gaps and promote equitable access to screening, treatment and support services.

Financial or insurance barriers can lead to delays in diagnosis and treatment, Qin said.

"Geographical barriers include limited transportation for rural communities with lack of access to care," she said.

Other social determinants of health — low health literacy and lack of healthy food and safe housing — can limit care delivery as well, she said.

Braun says improving 5-year survival rates more will take finding ways to overcome barriers to care, providing the highest quality of treatment in the Region and continuing to move away from a one-size-fits-all approach.

"People talk about whether we are going to cure cancer," he said. "I definitely think we will, but we can't put everything in the same box."