Expanding his medical empire is good for Patrick Soon-Shiong. But is it good for patients?
He’s spent years pushing to revolutionize health care, developing software systems for hospitals, a new genetic test for patients, and a slew of experimental cancer drugs.
Now, biotech billionaire Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong can run real-life experiments to test his vision. One of his foundations last year took control of a nonprofit hospital in Pennsylvania, and one of his businesses this summer took over six more in California. Last week, he also opened a new cancer center in El Segundo, Calif., down the street from Los Angeles International Airport.
He has made clear that he views his new medical facilities as laboratories for his approach and his products. That’s likely to be good for Soon-Shiong. The key question: Is it also good for patients?
Take his new El Segundo cancer center. He appears to be planning to use his pricey diagnostic test, GPS Cancer, routinely there. That would help one of his companies, which has struggled to sell the test nationally. It’s less clear whether patients will benefit: There’s no published data showing if this test works better than — or even as well as — any comparable tool on the market.
His team has also laid out plans to enroll virtually every patient at his cancer center in clinical trials. But the only two trials listed on the center’s website are testing highly experimental therapies being developed through Soon-Shiong’s for-profit businesses.
Another wrinkle: The three doctors running the clinic are also employed by Soon-Shiong’s companies — the very companies that are selling the diagnostic and developing the drugs they will consider using on patients.
This isn’t how drug development normally works. Indeed, Soon-Shiong’s arrangement stands out as highly unusual. Most drug companies don’t have their own employees setting up medical clinics to treat patients with therapies that are still being investigated. Instead, they undertake a painstaking process of introducing their experimental drugs to physician-researchers across the country and seeking permission to set up trial sites at independent hospitals. Asked if Soon-Shiong’s companies will have more traditional clinical trial
