Breast Cancer Patients Desire Early, Frequent Financial Screening

Many breast cancer patients would prefer their providers financially screen them throughout the treatment process, according to the results of a recent study called Financial Toxicity Screening Preferences in Patients With Breast Cancer.

“Most of our screening is done a single time or maybe twice, it's not something that we do longitudinally,” Laila Gharzai, M.D., LLM, from the Department of Radiation Oncology at Northwestern University and co-author said in an interview with Managed Healthcare Executive. “These patient voices can really tell us how we should start changing and what we should start doing differently to be able to incorporate patient voices better.”

Gharzai and her colleagues recently published the results of their study in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. The research team sent an anonymous survey to email subscribers of the nationwide breast cancer–specific philanthropic organization The Pink Fund, asking about financial toxicity screening preferences. Results revealed that patients preferred financial screening conversations be initiated by their providers (83%), happen early (at diagnosis, 45%; when treatment is selected, 37%) and once a month (36%).