Modest Out-of-Pocket Cost for Lung Cancer Screening, Downstream Procedures

In a national commercially insured population, invasive procedures after lung cancer screening occurred at higher rates than in clinical trials, but out-of-pocket costs were modest, according to study results published online ahead of print in the Journal of the American College of Radiology.

To gain a better understanding of episodes of care following lung cancer screening with low-dose chest computerized tomography (CT), researchers tapped the Clinformatics Data Mart and identified 6268 patients who underwent the procedure between 2015 and 2017.

According to the study, 7.4% of patients had at least one invasive procedure within a year of lung cancer screening. Among them, 69% received needle biopsy, 23.6% cytology, 18.6% bronchoscopy, and 23.8% surgery. Downstream procedures occurred more often among women and patients age 65 and older. One in five patients who received an invasive procedure were diagnosed with lung cancer after screening.

The cost of managing the population was approximately $5.06 million. On average, the per-episode out-of-pocket cost totaled $740.06, researchers reported. Aggregate out-of-pocket costs for patients were $427,070; out-of-pocket costs per episode averaged $62.46.

“Considering lung cancer screening and associated downstream procedures as an episode of care results in modest out-of-pocket cost,” researchers observed.

Reference:
Tailor TD, Bell S, Fendrick AM, Carlos RC. Total and out-of-pocket costs of procedures after lung cancer screening in a national commercially insured population: estimating an episode of care. J Am Coll Radiol. 2021 Sep 30;S1546-1440(21)00754-7. doi:10.1016/j.jacr.2021.09.015