From the September 2019 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine


I also would link that emphasis directly with support for the research mission ASTRO provides in order to move the field forward, and to make sure our newest members inherit a thriving and dynamic field that continues to be centered on our patients.

HCB News: What are the biggest challenges facing ASTRO members today?
TD: I think the restrictive coverage policies that payors have is a real issue for us and our patients. It is frequently a challenge obtaining prior authorization for treatment, which is associated with a large administrative burden and cost. ASTRO has done some work recently evaluating this topic across our membership. It’s been very clear that nearly uniformly — over 90 percent of our members have said — patients have been delayed in receiving radiation therapy because of restrictive prior authorization practices that are employed by many insurers. When a patient has a life-threatening illness, the associated threat with delaying their care is just not a healthy situation to be in whatsoever.
As it turns out, about two-thirds of those denials that originally come from these prior authorizations are overturned anyway. So it’s a process that’s stressful, potentially risky for the patient, and extremely expensive and problematic for the healthcare team. Most management of patients today is multi-modality, for example, chemotherapy plus radiation. These treatments have to be sequenced very accurately, and when there’s a delay in either side of that, it can throw everything off track. A week of delay for bureaucratic reasons could turn into a significant delay far beyond a week because everything needs to be resequenced.

HCB News: Other than what you previously mentioned, are there benefits to being a member of ASTRO?
TD: The other portion of education, to be a little more explicit, is the continuous learning through the various journals that ASTRO provides. There’s also the education provided through a myriad meetings we support. And the third major aspect is the linkages ASTRO creates with other professional organizations, which helps to create guidelines and other materials that educate our members and other oncologists on how to manage their patients.

For continuing education, a number of the articles in our publications qualify for self-assessment CME. One can read the article, then take an online questionnaire that asks some questions that show you grasped the key highlights of the article. Being able to support the busy clinicians by having this sort of opportunity directly in the publications they receive as a member of ASTRO, I think, is a very important way to support their needs and ensure a continuous level of education used to the benefit of our patients.

September 2019 Magazine

Read more stories from the September 2019 issue

More Exclusive Q&A

Rad Oncology Homepage