Trial, standard treatment costs comparable
A Mayo Clinic study has found that, contrary to conventional wisdom, the costs for clinical trials, which provide cancer patients with the latest most promising treatments available, are comparable to those for standard treatments.
The study, published in the May 1999 Journal of the National Cancer Institute, finds that the costs of treating cancer patients in clinical trials were modestly (e.g., less than 10%) higher than those for treating patients that were eligible for trials but opted instead for standard treatments. The average total five-year cost in 1995 inflation-adjusted dollars among trial enrollees was $46,424, compared with $44,143 for those not entering clinical trials.
"The widely held view by third-party payers is that clinical trials are much more expensive than standard treatment, but we now know that the costs are not budget-breaking," says Steve Albert, MD, a Mayo Clinic oncologist and the study’s principal investigator.
Based on this study’s findings, the researchers recommend payment for patient treatment in National Cancer Institute-approved clinical trials. "We hope this will encourage reimbursement by third-party payers, which will translate into better access to clinical trials for patients," says Albert. "This access, in turn, should lead to improved survival and quality of life for patients," he says, "and faster advancements in the search for new treatments for all cancers."
This study was conducted as a matched-case comparison of the incremental medical costs for participation in cancer treatment trials from the date of entry until either death or 60 months following entry into the trial. Case subjects were residents of Olmstead County, MN, who entered Phase II or III treatment trials at Mayo Clinic from 1988 through 1994.
Control subjects were patients not entering clinical trials, but eligible based on tumor type and other information in their medical records. Hospital, physician, and ancillary service costs were estimated from a population-based cost database developed at Mayo Clinic.
Results of this study are currently being considered by a committee at the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences that is currently considering potential Health Care Financing Administration financing policies with respect to Medicare coverage of clinical trial costs.
[For more information:
• Lisa Copeland or Tom Huyck at Mayo Clinic News Bureau, 200 First St., S.W., Rochester, MN 55905. Telephone: (507) 538-0844. E-mail: news [email protected].]
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