Radiology services account for nearly 20% of spending on cancer care in the U.S., one of the costliest services listed in a new study investigating medical charges in 2018.
Public health experts placed the total estimated price tag for cancer care among privately insured adults younger than 65 at a whopping $156.2 billion. Out of this figure, the group analyzed 38.4 million procedural codes totaling $10.8 billion.
Imaging exams—X-ray, CT, etc.—were responsible for $2.1 billion (19.4%) of that figure, the second most expensive category cited in the study, published Wednesday in JAMA Network Open.
Medical supplies and nonphysician services made up the highest total at $4 billion or 37%, the researchers reported. Surgery, meanwhile, contributed $1.8 billion.
“To our knowledge, this is the first characterization of service consumption and spending for privately insured adult patients younger than 65 years with cancer in the U.S.,” Nicholas G. Zaorsky, MD, MS, with Penn State Cancer Institute’s Department of Radiation Oncology, and co-authors wrote.
The researchers assessed the cost of care in 2018 for 402,115 patients with the most common types of cancer.
Breast cancer proved to be the costliest ($3.4B) and patients with this form of the disease underwent the greatest number of services (10.9 million). These individuals also incurred the highest radiology-related costs per year and received the greatest proportion of radiology services.
Lung, prostate and colorectum cancer patients also incurred higher radiology costs compared to other cancers.
At the same time, patients with colorectal cancer underwent 3.9 million services or 10.2% of the overall total, the next highest after breast cancer. Prostate cancer came in at 3.6 million (9.4%). Similarly, lung cancer accounted for $1.1 billion of overall spending while colorectal made up the same amount.
Zaorsky et al. noted their data, taken from MarketScan, mainly includes people employed by larger firms and may not accurately represent all privately insured individuals.
They will need to do more digging to determine which medical services may be needlessly pushing healthcare spending skyward.
“Further research is needed to explore the extent to which these costs reflect unnecessary or low-value care,” the team added.
Read the full study here.
Matt joined Chicago’s TriMed team in 2018 covering all areas of health imaging after two years reporting on the hospital field. He holds a bachelor’s in English from UIC, and enjoys a good cup of coffee and an interesting documentary.