Disease management is the future: breast cancer is the model

The breast care continuum is characterized by a wide variety of procedures and pathways leading to similar outcomes. This variation leads to very substantial differences in costs and patient experience, dependant upon physician choice of procedure or pathway. The breast center is uniquely positioned to develop disease management for the breast, including subspecialized care, the adoption of evidence-based protocols, and comprehensive management of outcome information. This approach to disease management focuses on physician excellence and is the key to increasing the quality of patient care, decreasing the overall cost of breast cancer, and increasing reimbursement and practice satisfaction for breast physicians.