Canadians with cancer spend an average $33K out of pocket for medical care: report
Canadians with cancer spend an average $33K out of pocket for medical care: report
While in-hospital costs such as surgery and chemotherapy are publicly covered, the report reveals the average cancer patient faces nearly $33,000 in costs over their lifetime. These include out-of-pocket expenses like prescribed medications, transportation to hospital and accommodation as well as lost income during treatment and recovery.
These are givens in the private healthcare industry. In the US these costs would run up past that level in a fraction of a year.
That said, I'm interested to know how universal healthcare would cover expenses like "lost income"? Sounds more like long-term disability insurance.
As a cancer survivor my out of pocket cost was $70 parking pass for the hospital Parking lot. Transport to from hospital I did myself until the nausea and fatigue got bad, then a local church volunteered and arranged a driver for me.
Ongoing care for me has been buying a high fluoride toothpaste which is about twice the price.So lost wages: I can see this being an issues. IF you are under a $ amount threshold previous tax year you can get income replacement through a cancer foundation fund. I earned too much the year before so did not qualify.
So for me it meant working anyway because I was supporting my family. Thankfully I had a WFH setup, so I could do 20 hours a week at whatever time of day I felt up to it, and in between vomiting. Some people may not have fortitude to do that and lose all their monthly income for several months.
One saving grace, Critical Illness Insurance. We had a line of credit that had a balance. The CII wiped the balance clean. So that was helpful during recovery.
Edit: I was self employed so had no disability insurance via work. However Canada Pension Plan has a disabilty plan you can tap into prior to retirement until you are back to normal. It only gives about $1000 a month currently I think
universal healthcare would cover expenses like "lost income"? Sounds more like long-term disability insurance.
That's a little much to ask for from healthcare. That's more an E-I thing.
And caring for a minor child I think qualifies.
TL;DR: if you're an adult and live within transit distance of a hospital in Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, or Montreal, the costs are probably manageable. For anyone else though, it's not.
Honestly, this sounds low.
My niece was diagnosed with stage IV neuroblastoma at 8 years old. She lives in Peachland, roughly an hour from Kelowna, and about 5 hours from Vancouver. Her parents both work, and one had to either give up work altogether so my niece could be accompanied to Vancouver for weeks and months, while the other worked the few days they could in the Okanagan then drive down to the cost to be with their daughter while she was on chemo.
The costs were brutal. Transport was a big one, and since they both ran their own business, both companies cratered. They stayed at Ronald McDonald House for much of their time in Vancouver (thankfully) but they couldn't stay the whole time and had to pay Vancouver rents for the remainder of her treatment.
They have two kids, so the other needed regular care. This was handled by her retired grandmother, who moved to Vancouver and took a job so she could help out.
My niece survived and is now turning 12. She's just been diagnosed again though, so they're all back on the treadmill. Thankfully this time it was found a lot earlier, so the prognosis is a lot better. She may only need to be in Vancouver for a short time this time.
Honestly, this sounds low.
As you alluded to, I think it's the fact that there are a lot of cases where patients have low-costs that bring down the average significantly. The CMAs you mentioned are ~47% of the Canadian population and there are a LOT of other cities that also do cancer treatment. I also get the impression that we've gotten much better at diagnosing and treating cancer, so for every complicated, high-cost patient, there are probably dozens of cases that have pretty straight forward treatment.
I really would love to see the distribution of cases.
Leiomyosarcoma that invaded and collapsed my spinal column here. It was significantly more than what they estimate in my case. All told it was around $76,000 extra on our budget and me not working ever again means ten years later we still struggle. We will never have savings or get out of debt in our lifetimes.
The article does link to the report from the Canadian Cancer Society. The report says that,
Over the lifetime of each person, an average of $11,199 in time costs, $16,018 in out-of-pocket costs and $5,560 in indirect costs are expected to be incurred by people with cancer and their caregivers. In total, and averaged across all cancer types, an individual is expected to incur $32,778 in costs related to cancer over their lifetime.
however the report doesn't break it down further, or explain exactly what makes up each of those categories, which is disappointing. As others pointed out, it would be nice to know things like:
-
Out of those "out-of-pocket" costs, how much can be claimed as medical expenses on an income tax return (15% tax credit), and is that factored in to the calculation?
-
How much is lost wages?
It's hard to consider ways of reducing these costs (Pharmacare, Welfare, refunds/tax credits for friends/family helping, etc) without knowing the details of these costs.
-