European experts back ‘Women, Thrombosis, Cancer’ educational program

On 26 September, Aspen Europe organized the first International Session of the ‘Women Thrombosis Cancer’ (WTC) initiative in Barcelona, Spain. The meeting was an opportunity for the WTC Steering Committee to share its new Continuing Medical Education (CME) program with 50 leading specialists from 11 European countries and gain their expert feedback.

David Pedelabat-Lartigau, Head of Marketing Thrombosis, Aspen Europe, said “It was exciting to see such important medical education activity live and the feedback from attendees in Barcelona was very positive”.

Venous thrombosis is the second leading cause of death in cancer patients (1). Yet there appears to be a general lack of awareness among clinicians of the higher risk of thrombosis in cancer patients and also of the best way to prevent or treat this disease.

WTC is the first of its kind – an educational platform to improve the diagnosis, treatment and monitoring of women with cancer at risk of venous thrombosis. By providing valuable accredited educational content to physicians and specialists in various target countries, the WTC initiative aims to improve the care of women with cancer at risk of or with established VTE, and ultimately improve patient outcomes. The program includes a collection of data from attendees in order to understand the current management of Thrombosis in Cancer patients and it will also measure the impact of the medical educational activities after they participate to the CME.

“This international meeting was the first step in engaging leading physicians in the educational content underpinning this important global initiative”, added David. “We expect now that several local activities are going to be developed in the European countries and hundreds of HCPs can participate to this CME project. The monitoring of the current and future practices will help the Steering Committee to develop international publications and future update of the CME program.

Aspen is the sole sponsor for the WTC initiative through an unrestricted educational grant to the International Initiative on Thrombosis and Cancer (ITAC) and the Steering Committee developing and managing the program group some of the most important experts in the Thrombosis field.

(1) Khorana AA, et al. J Thromb Haemost 2007;5:632-4.