Why Financial Toxicity is About More Than Just Affording Treatment

The idea of financial toxicity combines the physical stress of having a disease like breast cancer with concerns about affording treatment, according to Laila Gharzai, M.D., LLM, from the Department of Radiation Oncology at Northwestern University.

Financial toxicity is multifactorial and often affects younger patients in lower socioeconomic areas from minoritized racial/ethnic groups.

“It's not just the bill that comes into your mailbox,” Gharzai said in an interview with Managed Healthcare Executive. “There is, unfortunately, a direct link between financial toxicity and things like overall quality of life, medication adherence, sometimes decision making about what type of treatment to get.”

Gharzai and her colleagues recently published the results of a survey study called Financial Toxicity Screening Preferences in Patients With Breast Cancer in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. The research team sent an anonymous survey to email subscribers of a 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%).