The Australia New Zealand Gynaecological Oncology Group (ANZGOG) is the national gynaecological cancer clinical trials organisation for Australia and New Zealand. ANZGOG’s purpose is to improve outcomes and quality of life for women with gynaecological cancer through conducting and promoting cooperative clinical trials and undertaking multidisciplinary research into the causes, prevention and treatments of gynaecological cancer.
ANZGOG required assistance with writing a review article around the topics covered at their two-part member education webinar series titled ‘Ovarian Cancer Systems of Care’ held in November and December 2020.
Webinar presentations were given by renowned clinical and research experts in ovarian cancer, and highlighted updates on the latest developments in ovarian cancer diagnosis, genetic testing, medical and surgical interventions, and follow-up programs currently underway.
We have previously provided medical writing assistance to members of ANZGOG, and was referred by a well-known client to undertake the task of writing what turned out to be a comprehensive review article, referencing over 90 peer-reviewed articles, and distilling the results of over 30 ovarian cancer clinical trials. Suffice it to say this was a major medical writing job. The responses from the journal reviewers to the first submission were minimal.
“Manuscript has nicely summarized the current ovarian cancer diagnosis, genetic testing, treatment modalities and follow up plan” (Reviewer # 1 comment). Reviewer #2 requested additional material that was beyond the scope of the webinar series, and to which I provided a very recent review article that covered the topic.
The editor-in-chief of the journal also thanked us for a ‘fine contribution’ upon receipt of our response to reviewers’ comments, which was accepted as written.
We noted to our client that in our recent experience we have seen delays in responses to submitted manuscripts, and many academics who would normally serve as peer reviewers are under restrictions or working remotely due to the current pandemic. We followed up regularly to ensure our manuscript was being processed.
“I have been glad to have you on the project and doing all the follow-up and contribution to manuscript development” (A. Evans, CEO, ANZGOG).
It was a pleasure to be involved with such a worthwhile organization that focuses on improving women’s health. Beyond the opportunity to write this review article, it was incredibly exciting to learn that women with inherited BRCA1/2 mutations who are diagnosed with ovarian tumours once thought to be ‘silent killers’, can now be treated with therapies that may have curative potential, thanks to decades of research by some of our most talented ANZGOG members. As always, the notification that our article is published and publicly available is exciting news.