My husband Carl and I have worked hard all of our lives. We
both went to college, earned a living, raised a family, contributed to society,
and hoped to leave the world a better place because we were here. Cancer reared
its ugly head when we least expected it, and it took a financial and emotional
toll on us. Becoming a proactive patient has helped me to personally deal with
my diagnosis of 17p deleted leukemia.
As you all know, I have just completed nine months in a
clinical trial with an experimental drug Ibrutinib, which will not cure the
leukemia, but seems to be keeping it at bay, until a cure can be found. Hurrah!
It looks like the FDA will approve of the drug in a year or so. This will be my
lifeline and has changed my chances for survival. Hurrah! Now the next obstacle
in our lives… How much am I going to have to pay to survive?
Here is a quote from the Blood Journal Report, which was
prepublished April 25, 2013:
“Of the
12 drugs approved by the FDA for various cancer indications in 2012, 11 were
priced above $100,000 per year. Cancer drug prices have almost doubled from a
decade ago, from an average of $5,000 per month to more than $10,000 per
month.”
If the cost of Ibrutinib follows in suit with today’s cost
of Imatinib, more commonly known as Gleevac, which is a drug for chronic
myeloid leukemia, the drug company will probably price it about $100,000 per
year. Hmmm… My husband is retired. I am not working now. I don’t believe we
have an extra $100,000 per year laying around to pay for my survival. I wonder
if my insurance will help me pay for this? We are not alone in this situation. I
guess we will cross that road when we get there.
All I can say is “Thank God for compassionate and sensible
physicians.” Dr. Hagop
Kantarjian from M.D. Anderson in Houston is taking the lead with a paper in the
Blood Journal Report:
“The
Price of Drugs for Chronic Myeloid Leukemia (CML); A Reflection of the
Unsustainable Prices of Cancer Drugs: From the Perspective of a Large Group of
CML Experts.”
Dr. Kantarjian
states:
“As a
group of more than 100 experts in chronic myeloid leukemia (CML), we draw
attention to the high prices of cancer drugs, with the particular focus on the
prices of approved tyrosine kinase inhibitors for the treatment of CML. This
editorial addresses the multiple factors involved in cancer drug pricing, their
impact on individual patients and healthcare policies, and argues for the need
to lower the prices of cancer drugs to allow more patients to afford them and
to maintain sound long-term healthcare policies.”
Blood
Journal Report full article:
The New
York Times article, published April 25, 2013, states that physicians in more
than 15 countries on more than five continents have joined together to suggest
“… that charging high prices for a medicine needed to keep someone alive is
profiteering, akin to jacking up the prices of essential goods after a natural
disaster.”
New
York Times full article
Stay
tuned for the next adventure of “Dr. La Verne’s Awesome Adventure: Slaying the
Leukemia Dragon.”
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