Breast Rebuilds After Big C? 4 of 5 Don’t!
Breast Reconstruction Comments Off
Somebody is not getting the word.
The struggle to require all insurance policies to cover breast reconstruction with breast plastic surgery after mastectomy was a big deal and literally required an act of Congress a little over a decade ago.
So you could call it the law of the land.
But Alicia Holt MD, a surgical fellow at the Hope Medical Center in Duarte, California, started counting heads of how many breast cancer patients in California choose breast reconstruction after their breast surgery to remove them via mastectomy.
Dr. Holt studied reconstruction rates after breast cancer surgery in California from 2003 to 2007. She saw a slight improvement, with 21.4 percent of women choosing reconstruction in ’07 while ’08 saw 29.3 percent of breast cancer patients going back under the knife for breast augmentation.
Reporting on her study at the annual meeting of the American Society of Breast Surgeons (ASBS) in Las Vegas, Dr. Holt found some limiting factors that influence a woman’s decision including:
- Insurance type
- Ethnicity
- Hospital type
Not surprisingly, Dr. Holt found women under 40 had the highest rates of breast reconstruction.
However, African-Americans were half as likely as Anglo background women to opt for breast rebuilding right away.
Patients with private insurance go in for plastic surgery breast reconstruction before women with Medi-Cal, the California health insurance program for low-income women.
Finally, patients at teaching or National Cancer Institute-qualified facilities were more likely to have breast surgery reconstruction.
According to Dr. Holt, breast cancer patients were just not getting the word that reconstruction is a right afforded them by national legislation.
One participant in the study, a breast cancer surgeon, says she requires her patients to see a plastic surgeon, even if they have decided to forego breast reconstruction.
But Deanna Attai, MD, director of Burbank’s Center for Breast Care said another difficulty could be getting trained plastic surgeons – who normally work on a cash upfront basis – to do the procedure and accept insurance payments.
Concluded the doctors: “We need to get more information out, not only to patients but to the providers of plastic surgery.
Amen to THAT!
admin @ May 19, 2010