Direct care

Illustration: Shannon May, Photo: Adobe Stock

The wait time between diagnosis and treatment has gotten even longer for patients with several types of cancers.

A retrospective study published Aug. 12 in JAMA Surgery found that, from 2012 to 2023, wait times increased for patients diagnosed with Stage 1 through Stage 3 breast, colon, lung, pancreatic, gastric, or esophageal cancer. All patients in the study had gone through a surgical resection.

While this study didn’t examine the effects delays may have had on patients’ health outcomes, other studies have shown that longer wait times are associated with poorer outcomes, Tsion Minas, a cancer researcher and instructor in pathology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, told Healthcare Brew.

“The trend is a bit concerning…It’s definitely going to have [an] impact,” Minas said. “For some cancer types, it could have a very detrimental impact.”

Get the breakdown of the study here.—MA

      

From The Crew

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If you want the behind-the-scenes reality of building great companies, you’ve found your place. Subscribe to Founder Brew today.

Direct care

David Dee Delgado/Getty Images

Tens of thousands of people have been diagnosed with cancer linked to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

According to the World Trade Center (WTC) Health Program, a federal initiative run by a division of the CDC, roughly 52,700 first responders and survivors have been certified for a form of cancer. The program was created in 2010 and provides monitoring and treatment for victims of the attacks.

Northwell Health, the largest health system in New York, issued a press release on Sept. 8 stating it has seen a rise in 9/11-related cancer cases in recent years.

“Our fear is that cancer diagnoses will only rise as we move into the next 25 years,” Jacqueline Moline, director of Northwell’s WTC Health Program, said in the release.

Keep reading here.—MA

      

Tech

Nicole Semeraro

Nicole Semeraro’s career as a founder started while she was still working for one of the largest companies in the world.

But Semeraro wasn’t building a side hustle while working her day job. Instead, she founded Specialist Management Solutions, which launched as a subsidiary of healthcare services provider Optum, as an “intrepeneur.”

The experience gave her an inside look at the industry—and prepared her to eventually build a company of her own.

In 2023, Semeraro founded Karias Health, which she calls a “guided care intelligence platform” designed to help consumers make better healthcare decisions. Karias’s products include Faith AI, a virtual companion that helps patients keep track of information discussed during medical visits.

In a conversation with Founder Brew, Semeraro shares what she underestimated about building in health tech, why she’s focused on building an operationally strong company over chasing growth, and how her passion for helping people propelled her to leave the comfort of the corporate world and run her own venture.

Read the interview on Founder Brew.—JH

      

vital signs

Francis Scialabba

Today’s top healthcare reads.

Stat: 8.1%. That’s the portion of US infants not receiving vitamin K shots at birth, as of the end of June, per one study. These shots significantly lower the risk of life-threatening bleeding. (Reuters)

Quote: “I would argue that there are probably more problems totally unrelated to AI in healthcare than there are problems that AI can fix in the next five years.”—Graham Walker, a San Francisco emergency physician and founder of health tech startups MDCalc and Offcall, on AI’s potential to solve healthcare’s biggest issues (Stat)

Read: Hospitals turn to team-based approaches to help patients with substance use disorders. (Fierce Healthcare)

Jobs

Real jobs, shared through real communities. CollabWORK brings opportunities directly to Healthcare Brew readers—no mass postings, no clutter, just roles worth seeing. Click here to view the full job board.

• Clinical Resource Director at HealthTrust Supply Chain
• Chief Nursing Officer at UVA Encompass Health Rehabilitation Hospital
• Chief Executive Officer at CHI St. Vincent Sherwood Rehabilitation Hospital
• Director of Nursing at PruittHealth
• Director of Nursing (DON) at Signature HealthCARE of Georgetown