Economic Factors May Affect Getting Guideline-Recommended Breast Cancer Treatment

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131209084151.htm

Dec. 9, 2013 — Women with interruptions in health insurance coverage or with low income levels had a significantly increased likelihood of failing to receive breast cancer care that is in concordance with recommended treatment guidelines, according to results presented here at the Sixth AACR Conference on the Science of Cancer Health Disparities in Racial/Ethnic Minorities and the Medically Underserved, held Dec. 6-9.

Women with a break in their insurance coverage had a 3.5-fold higher likelihood of nonconcordance with National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) guidelines for radiation therapy and chemotherapy compared with women with uninterrupted coverage.

"We found that women who had no insurance at some point during treatment, women with lower incomes compared with those in the highest income categories, and women who held more debt at the time of diagnosis were less likely to receive all of the recommended breast cancer treatments," said Jean A. McDougall, Ph.D., M.P.H., a postdoctoral fellow at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Wash.

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The researchers found that women with an annual family income of less than $50,000 were more than twice as likely to have received care that was not in concordance with guidelines for radiation therapy compared with women with an income of greater than $90,000 per year. In addition, they had an almost five times higher likelihood for nonconcordance with chemotherapy guidelines, and an almost four times higher likelihood for nonconcordance with endocrine therapy guidelines.

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