For young adults with cancer, adhering to treatment plans has long been a challenge for a lot of reasons. But passage of the Affordable Care Act, which expanded coverage to millions, suggests insurance, not unwillingness to return for care, remains the biggest barrier.
A recent study suggests young adults with cancer who are protected under the ACA’s dependent coverage provision were more likely to remain on private insurance longer than patients who were not offered the same protections. The ACA requires that employer-based health plans offer coverage to the children of workers until age 26.
The study, published late last month in JCO Oncology Practice by researchers at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the University of San Francisco Benioff Children’s Hospitals, heightens concern about upcoming Supreme Court rulings that could overturn part or all of the ACA. The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments today.
“In an ideal world, all patients would have continuous health coverage that was recommended by doctors and their medical team,” said Lena Winestone, lead author of the paper and an assistant professor in pediatrics at UCSF. “The ACA is one solution to the problem that our patients are not getting necessary care in the health system that we currently have in place. Because of the Supreme Court case, it’s possible that even really popular components of the ACA, like the dependent coverage provision, are at risk.”
Winestone said the study focused on young people with cancer because that age group has been identified by the National Cancer Institute to be particularly vulnerable.
To quantify the impact of the ACA’s dependent coverage provision, researchers selected patients who were born in 1982 or later, and who were diagnosed between Jan. 1, 2000, and Oct. 1, 2015, with the most common types of cancers among adolescent patients. These include Hodgkin lymphoma, acute myeloid leukemia and thyroid cancer. The patients were split into two cohorts. Those in the older group were not protected by the ACA when they turned 19 or graduated college, when health plans were allowed to remove adult children from their parents’ coverage. Those in the younger group were protected by the ACA. The patients in the older cohort were then matched to ones in the younger group based on similar cancer diagnosis dates.
Younger patients stayed enrolled in their insurance plan for longer on average — 26 months, compared with 22 months for patients in the older cohort. Younger patients were also more likely to retain insurance coverage over four years, compared with older patients — 37 percent vs. 31 percent.
Winestone said insurance coverage is particularly important for young people with cancer, as it’s easy for them to “fall through the cracks between pediatricians and adult doctors.”
“Particularly for oncology, it’s essential for patients to get the care that they need,” Winestone said.
Insurance is also important for cancer survivors because they are often affected by chronic medical conditions, researchers said.
