Young adults, who are not yet economically independent, have economic problems. After the initial sense of relief to be able to bear the impending expenses, they then confess a sense of humiliation
They use crowdfunding, a form of collective financing, to pay the expenses they have to incur after receiving a diagnosis of cancer, but then have to deal with the psychological burden of having asked for help from relatives and friends. To highlight the difficulties for young adults who get cancer in the United States, an American study published in Journal of Cancer Survivorship
in which the experiences of about 50 patients under 40 who needed financial support to be treated were investigated.
Financial toxicity caused by cancer
Online crowdfunding platforms can be used by individuals or associations to launch fundraising campaigns in order to finance an initiative to which the community can decide to contribute by making a donation. Since in the US there is no free universal health system like the Italian ones, exams, visits and treatments (including therefore also oncological ones) are paid and the price is paid, for those who have it, by an insurance that is not always for offers the full coverage you need. In America, financial toxicity is a very widespread problem and many patients decide to give up oncological treatments, thus avoiding that the disease leads them to bankruptcy and ruin the life prospects of the whole family – he explains. Francesco Perrone, elected president of the Italian Association of Medical Oncology (Aiom) -. Although in Italy we are protected by our precious NHS, the economic consequences of the disease are felt due to the many expenses that patients and family members have to face out of their own pockets: such as travel to the hospital, home care or rehabilitation therapies. To which are added a decrease in income due to the drop in productivity and the repercussions on work.
Study and psychological distress
Young adults are even less protected: they are between 20 and 40 years old, they are generally starting to work, but they don’t earn much and are often not financially independent. In the United States, many of them have no insurance coverage and are unable to afford the cost of treatment when they are diagnosed with cancer. The best known crowdfunding platform in the USA (GoFundMe) welcomes over 250 thousand medical initiatives every year for a total of 650 million dollars annually collected through donations from people who support the needs of sick and family members – says Lauren V. Ghazal, first author of the study and researcher at the University of Michigan -. In our survey, the 46 patients who asked for help received an average of less than $ 3,500 each. Half of them did not reach the goal they indicated and failed to raise the amount of money necessary for the purpose he set himself. In addition to not reaching the goal, most of the respondents admit that they have suffered the psychological backlash of the request for help. If on the one hand, in fact, the sick describe the money obtained as a lifesaver and report an initial sense of relief for having been able to meet the impending expenses, they then confess a sense of shame, humiliation and inadequacy for having asked for help, combined with a heavy unease at having been forced to make public both their illness and economic difficulties.
Economic problems for one in four sufferers
From studies also conducted in Italy it emerged that approx a quarter of the sick complained of economic hardship linked to the disease and its treatment – concludes Perrone, director of the Clinical Trials Structure of the National Cancer Institute Pascale in Naples and coordinator of the Italian investigations on financial toxicity -. Tracing an identikit is difficult, but difficulties have been reported more frequently women, patients treated in hospitals in central and southern Italy, under the age of 65. This last figure makes us understand how the disease produces a very significant damage to people of working age. So what you “spend” must add what you “no longer earn” due to cancer. Not only that, for one in five patients the lack of money is reflected in a worsening of the prognosis. In fact, the survival analysis also showed that those who suffered from financial toxicity had, in the months and years following treatment, a 20% higher risk of death (in the US 79%) compared to the sick without money problems.
March 21, 2022 (change March 21, 2022 | 17:55)
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