Intermountain Health is expanding its innovative and high-level cancer treatment program to more hospitals across Utah, Colorado, and Montana, to give greater access to rural patients without the requirement of long and frequent travel.
Bispecific T-cell Engager (BiTE) therapy is for patients who need enhanced care when typical cancer treatment is not working. BiTE therapy is used to treat cancerous tumors, using immunotherapy to convince the immune cells to attack the cancer cells.
The initial challenge for patients, however, was that the only place patients could receive this treatment was at Intermountain Health LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City and Intermountain Health St. Vincent Regional Hospital in Billings, Mont. Patients were required to travel weekly when beginning treatment, and then every couple of weeks for maintenance doses. But traveling – sometimes for hours — for treatment, while fighting cancer made trying to maintain a relatively normal life even more difficult…