pLOG

2022-11-29

Hundreds of thousands of self-paid medicines? Where to raise money

There are 6 big money pits for common cancer treatment, including Da Vinci surgery, which is about 100,000-300,000 each time, chemotherapy including antiemetic and nutritional injections, which ranges from about 10,000-40,000 per month, and the gamma/spiral knife for new radiotherapy depends on the course of treatment. 140,000 to 350,000, and proton knife therapy may cost 300,000 to 800,000 depending on the course of treatment. Recently, the well-known target therapy and immunotherapy may also cost 2.5 to 3 million per year. It will become a gap in the cost of medicines for many patients.

 

In addition, patients have many myths about cancer bills. The following three myths are provided to clear up the confusion:

Is health care medicine the best treatment option recognized by the government?

  • Physicians provide comprehensive medication advice and prescriptions. If patients are affordable and want to seek more drug options, they can take the initiative to ask the doctor.

I have health insurance, but only a few people need to pay for it?

  • Even with health insurance, there is still a high probability of paying for it! The self-payment survey report of cancer patients found that as many as 75% of cancer patients have paid for their own treatment, and 20% of them have spent more than one million.

Early preventive treatment, high out-of-pocket amount, more end-stage health insurance subsidies and less out-of-pocket?

  • Not necessarily, the self-payment survey report of cancer patients shows that 47% of stage 0~2 cancer patients have self-pay amount below 200,000 yuan; stage 3~4 cancer patients exceed The proportion of one million self-payment is more than 10% than that of Phase 0~2.

 

However, self-financed new drugs and new treatments cost millions, and the financial burden may bring "financial toxicity" to patients, impacting the body, mind and quality of life. The following four symptoms are provided to help patients assess whether they have suffered from financial toxicity, as well as "American Medicine The Journal of Society Oncology proposes that there are three major solutions to financial toxicity:

Financial Toxicity Assessment:

  • Symptom 1: In order to reduce expenditure, do not take medicine according to doctor's advice, receive medicine or reduce dosage by oneself.
  • Symptom 2: Start borrowing and reorganize family financial allocation.
  • Symptom 3: Reduce spending on food, clothing, leisure and entertainment.
  • Symptom 4: Anxiety, stress, and depression.

Three major solutions to financial toxicity:

  • Solution 1: Review your insurance policy and confirm the benefits of insurance benefits.
  • Solution 2: Seek economic and social welfare support, including social workers from hospitals and private units.
  • Solution 3: Inform the medical team of your financial difficulties in detail.

 

It is not that patients do not have resources, but that the resources provided by each unit are different, so it is more important to find the cancer resources that suit them!

Decryption of hospital resources:

  • Social Work Office - mainly assists economically disadvantaged families and provides emergency subsidies for (non-) government units.
  • Cancer Resource Center - Depending on the hospital, there are wigs or assistive device rentals, patient associations and other resources.
  • Attending Physician/Cancer Personal Manager - Assist in relevant medical referrals, including psychologists, nutritionists, etc., and provide information on patient support and subsidy programs for special prescription drugs of pharmaceutical companies.
  • Medical Affairs Section - In case of arrears for cancer patients, some hospitals will provide arrears such as IOUs and promissory notes.

Out-of-Hospital Resource Evaluation Recommendations:

  • Commercial insurance - review with the "insurance clerk" all private insurance policy benefits that may be used for treatment. Such as: hospitalization medical insurance, major injury and disease insurance, cancer insurance, hospitalization out-of-pocket insurance, regular cancer insurance from property insurance, etc.
  • Bank Financial Solutions - Loans & Credit Cards - Apply with banks for movable property/credit loan solutions such as caravan mortgages or hospital credit card installments.
  • Social or company insurance - company group insurance medical insurance and social insurance: labor insurance, fishing insurance, military insurance, agricultural insurance, public insurance, etc., or medical subsidies from related trade unions.
  • Social resources - look for "District Chief" or search for "Cancer Social Subsidy" on the Internet to seek relevant subsidies. It is not easy to raise funds for related subsidies, so it needs to go through multiple audits, which is time-consuming and laborious.