Recently Diagnosed or Relapsed? Stop Looking For a Miracle Cure, and Use Evidence-Based Therapies To Enhance Your Treatment and Prolong Your Remission
Multiple Myeloma an incurable disease, but I have spent the last 25 years in remission using a blend of conventional oncology and evidence-based nutrition, supplementation, and lifestyle therapies from peer-reviewed studies that your oncologist probably hasn't told you about.
Click the orange button to the right to learn more about what you can start doing today.
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Multiple Myeloma Treatment- Financial Burden, OOP Costs
However, over time, patients with multiple myeloma incur more OOP costs. Accumulated OOP costs for 3 years following diagnosis was $9127 for patients with multiple myeloma.
First some bad news and then some real bad news. You’ve been diagnosed with multiple myeloma (MM). Multiple myeloma treatment is expensive. According to the article linked and excerpted below, MM is one of the cancers with the greatest financial burden to the patient, including high out-of-pocket costs (OOP) of any cancer.
While the article linked and excerpted below goes into some detail comparing conventional vs. high-dedutible health insurance, I’ve chosen not to focus on the issue of insurance for this blog post.
Now some good news.
Yes, managing multiple myeloma treatment is expensive. But as someone who has been managing his own MM treatment since 1994, I can say that MM costs, especially out-of-pocket costs, can be managed.
And I’m not just talking about possible quack therapies either.
Consider:
- X-rays instead of much more expensive imaging studies- ask your oncologist-
- lower doses of your regimen- lower dose, less money-
- Integrative therapies to reduce the dose and/or frequency of expensive chemotherapy regimens
- Less expensive chemotherapy regimens that act biologically in the same way as more expensive drugs
Have you been diagnosed with multiple myeloma? Are you about to begin your multiple myeloma treatment? Are you worried about the financial toxicity of a MM diagnosis? Scroll down the page, post a question or comment and I will reply to you ASAP.
Hang in there,
David Emerson
- MM Survivor
- MM Cancer Coach
- Director PeopleBeatingCancer
Recommended Reading:
- Multiple Myeloma Specialists- MM Cancer Coaching
- Multiple Myeloma End of Life Cost Implications- Hospice or Home?
- Multiple Myeloma and Maintenance Therapy
Cost Burden for Patients With Blood Cancers Eclipses the Burden in Other Cancers
“Patients with blood cancers (MM) are burdened with higher costs than other cancers, and spending in blood cancers does not return to precancer levels, according to a new study from the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS)…
The study used real-world claims data of 2332 patients with blood cancer with commercial insurance who were initially diagnosed in 2014. Lymphoma accounted for the majority of patients (63%), followed by chronic leukemia and multiple myeloma (12% each), and acute leukemia and bone marrow disorders (6% each)…
The most expensive time for a patient with blood cancer was the month of diagnosis, the study found. Inpatient hospital services accounted for the majority (55%) of total allowed spending in the month of diagnosis. After that, anticancer drug therapy accounts for approximately one-third of total allowed spending. While total allowed spending decreases over time, they never return to prediagnosis levels, according to the report…
In the first year after diagnosis, patients with acute leukemia had the highest allowed spending ($463,414 vs $156,845 average for all blood cancers) and highest OOP ($5147 vs $3877 average for all blood cancers). However, over time, patients with multiple myeloma incur more OOP costs. Accumulated OOP costs for 3 years following diagnosis was $8797 for patients with acute leukemia and $9127 for patients with multiple myeloma. The average for other blood cancers over the 3 years following diagnosis was $7800…