Solving the Unsolvable: Sean Parker, Dr. Francis Collins, Dr. Laura Esserman at Time 100 Health Summit
Behind any landmark cure is years of medical research. But the old goal of research — to find a one-size-fits-all treatment for a disease, based on a set of standard protocols — must radically change to further and diversify advances in the field, experts argued at the TIME 100 Health Summit on Thursday. “We’re all in it, at the end of the day, for our patients,” said Dr. Laura Esserman, professor of surgery at the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine. “We want to get people to a better outcome.” In the field of breast cancer, for example, the same cancer screening and treatment guidelines have traditionally been applied across the board. But people have different genetic profiles and risk factors, necessitating a range of different approaches. “Breast cancer is many diseases,” Esserman said, and a treatment path for one patient may not be appropriate for another.