Financial toxicity in clinical care today: a “menu without prices”

Cancer has an impact on patients and their families in a myriad of ways. As Koczwara and colleagues point out in their letter, this is not just related to the direct costs of clinical care, which was the main focus of our article,1 but may impact the treatment decisions or alter the life course in many ways.

Cancer interrupts people’s lives. To date, there has been too little emphasis on the long term effects of cancer, even after successful definitive treatment. Many people give account of prolonged periods of time when they are unable to work, or are unable to work at the level at which they did before. Too little attention has been paid to the physical rehabilitation of patients, especially if their cancer treatment is otherwise considered a success.

Cancer and its treatments entail a number of challenges to the physical and emotional wellbeing. To optimise health outcomes, it is crucial to ensure adequate support for patients and their families from the time that cancer is recognised until they have returned to the best level of function they will be able to achieve, and this may be months or even years after treatment starts.2

It is required to have a greater understanding of the broader financial burden of cancer, its treatment and impact on work, to better establish services to assist with rehabilitation, which may critically help reduce the financial factors contributing to poorer outcomes for people of lower financial capacity, and to the wider impact a cancer diagnosis may have for the family.