Value Of Waiving Coinsurance For Colorectal Cancer Screening In Medicare Beneficiaries.

ABSTRACT: Financial barriers to colorectal cancer screening persist despite the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Medicare beneficiaries may face 20 percent coinsurance for a screening colonoscopy when the procedure includes the removal of polyps or follows a positive fecal screening test. Using an established microsimulation model, we estimated that waiving this coinsurance would result in 1.7 fewer colorectal cancer deaths (a decrease of 13 percent) and $17,000 higher colorectal cancer-related costs (an increase of 0.6 percent) for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services per 1,000 sixty-five-year-olds, assuming a 10-percentage-point increase in the rates of first colonoscopy screening, follow-up, and surveillance. If the rates did not change, waiving coinsurance would increase total costs by $51,0

SUBMITTER: Peterse EFP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6067012 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature