‘Something Is Wrong’: Sobering Cancer-Related Medical Debt

This transcript has been edited for clarity. 
Hello. I’m Dr Maurie Markman from City of Hope. I’d like to discuss a very interesting and somewhat sobering topic, which is survivor views on medical debt in the cancer arena. 
What I’m describing here are survey results from the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network. This organization did a survey that included 1284 cancer patients and survivors nationwide who had been diagnosed with cancer and treated over the past 7 years. The survey was conducted between March 18 and April 14, 2024. 
There’s been a large amount of discussion, of course, about the rising costs of cancer care, but I think hearing the data from the cancer patients themselves is both important and, as I said, sobering. 
What was learned here is that 47%, nearly half, of the cancer patients and survivors had medical debt related to their cancer. Of that group, about half carried over $5000 in medical debt, and 69% had carried this debt for over a year. One third had this debt related to cancer for more than 3 years. 
Very importantly, 98% of the people in this survey had medical insurance, so we’re not talking about individuals with no care. This is a population where, if anybody should be okay, this group should be okay because they have insurance. 
The health implications of this are really disturbing. As noted in the survey, over three times more individuals who had cancer-related medical debt were behind on cancer-related screenings compared with those who did not have debt; it was 18% vs 5%.
Of those with medical debt, 27% had gone without adequate food. I’ll say that again: One quarter of those with cancer-related medical debt had gone without adequate food, and 25% had skipped or delayed care. 
If one asked about the direct financial consequences related to medical debt , nearly half saw their credit scores deteriorate and 30% had difficulty qualifying for loans. The numbers speak for themselves. 
Our goal is to treat — and where we can, cure — cancer. If we can’t cure, the goal is to extend survival, and where we can’t extend survival to a large extent, the goal is to improve the quality of life of patients. Yet, we see here in this survey of more than 1000 patients — this is not a small group — the impact that the cost and method of payment is having on our patients and their families. 
Is this acceptable? I would argue that something is wrong. These are recent data from the American Cancer Society. I’m sure there’ll be more surveys coming along in the future. Based on the way things are going, I suspect the data will only look more disturbing. 
I thank you for your attention and encourage all of you to think with us as to how we’re going to overcome this problem. Again, our therapies are becoming more effective. The impact on the quality of life, as relates to the treatment, is becoming superior, but medical debt is having an incredibly negative impact on our patients and their families. What’s to be done about it?