In the News ;
More and more cancer practices have been
forced to cut back
or close their doors,
according to the
nonprofit Community Oncology
Alliance, which says 41 clinics have closed
nationwide by July this year. As a result,
an untold number of patients must travel
great distances for treatment. ; The reasons? At least 11 percent of Medicare patients
have no supplemental insurance to cover the
20 percent copayment for health services—
or they earn too much to qualify for other assistance, but not enough to a;ord their care.
; One of these patients was Leroy Smith of
Turkey, N.C. He had to travel more than 42
miles to a Goldsboro, N.C., hospital, instead
of a local cancer clinic, for chemotherapy for
gallbladder cancer. One injection alone of a
drug Smith needed has a $450 copay. Unfortunately, the cancer clinic closest to his
home said it couldn’t a;ord to absorb what
Smith or Medicare couldn’t pay, or find other
assistance to cover those costs. Smith died
in October. ; Oncologist Clinton Merrill,
M.D., says costs of $200,000 to $400,000
a month for cancer drugs and declining
Medicare reimbursement rates caused him
to close his eight-year-old practice in Laramie, Wyo. More than half of the 200 patients
he served were on Medicare, and he says he
was reimbursed only for about 56 percent of
the cost of their care. ; “If half your reimbursement begins to go south, with that kind
of cash flow, and that kind of overhead, you
begin to get in trouble pretty quickly,” Merrill says. —Laurie Udesky
Clinic
Cutbacks
Hurt
Cancer
Patients
; Oncologist Clinton Merrill
MATT SLABY/LUCEO
