Cost of Cancer Care

The cost of cancer care has been steadily rising and patients are bearing more of the financial burden, paying increasingly larger portions out of their own pockets for their care. Rising costs are found in every element of cancer care: hospitalizations, diagnostic testing, patient out-of-pocket costs, and the steadily-increasing prices of specialty drugs as you can see in this infographic. All indications suggest that these costs will only continue to escalate unless stakeholders work together on significant reforms.

The solution

LLS is engaged in discussions with stakeholders across the cancer healthcare system – doctors and hospitals, policymakers and legislators, insurers, pharmacy benefit managers and drugmakers – to find ways to lessen the burden for patients.

LLS priorities:

• Value-based payments: Advocate for payment arrangements for prescription drugs based on their value to patients, and programs that incentivize value-driven care decisions by doctors and hospitals.
• Drug competition: Work collaboratively with policy makers to remove barriers that prevent generic drug manufacturers from being able to develop and bring generic and biosimilar versions of costly brand drugs to market.
• Medicare Part D cap: Press lawmakers to cap the amount Medicare Part D beneficiaries must pay out of their own pockets to obtain their medications—a proposal endorsed by both the Trump administration and key Democratic congressional leaders.
• Provider reimbursement reform: Urge Medicare officials to further leverage tools like the Oncology Care Model to test additional reimbursement reforms that reward doctors and hospitals for providing high-quality, efficient oncology care.

Progress to date

The LLS national “Progress Report on the Cost of Cancer Care,” reviews policy measures taken this past year after launching the Cost of Care Initiative to ease the burden on patients and, importantly, to highlight areas where more work is critically needed. Read more