Costs associated with follow-up care are too expensive for young cancer survivors, even if they have health insurance, according to a new study published in the journal Cancer. Cancer survivors between 20 and 39 years old were 67 percent more likely than cancer-free patients to forgo medical care because of cost, reported WebMD Health News. "The level of medical care that's required is much greater than for your typical 20- or 30-year-old who may go to the doctor once a year and have a few lab tests done," said Anna Franklin, a pediatrician with MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, who wasn't involved in the research.
Follow-up care is crucial to ensuring those patients remain healthy and avoid incurring additional medical costs. "This was surprising because survivors look like they have health insurance coverage at the same levels as the general population," said researcher Anne Kirchhoff, an assistant professor of pediatrics at Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah. "It seems like they may need additional resource support beyond health insurance coverage." Article