A proposed new law could make it easier for terminally ill patients to get access to potentially life-saving drugs. The process, known as expanded access, or compassionate use, was a topic at this year’s annual Childhood Cancer Summit in Washington, D.C., Friday.
The summit is the yearly meeting of the Childhood Cancer Caucus, co-founded in 2009 by Central Texas Congressman Michael McCaul, in order to better direct Congressional resources and efforts to the cause of preventing pediatric cancer.
McCaul was also a friend of Austin attorney Andrea Sloan, 45, who waged a brave, public battle for compassionate use in 2013 while in the final stages of ovarian cancer. After months of requests, an anonymous drug company ultimately granted Sloan compassionate use of a drug, but her disease had progressed quickly and she passed away on Jan. 1, 2014.
McCaul said he is ready to introduce new legislation in Congress in Sloan’s honor that would keep other patients from having to wait so long for their requests to be granted—time they do not have.
