A cancer patient pushes his drip stand as he walks down the hallway of the Beijing Cancer Hospital July 12, 2011. REUTERS/David Gray
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - U.S. oncologists, aware that patients are paying more of the costs of expensive cancer drugs, are increasingly declining to prescribe medicines that have scant or no effect, even as a last resort.
At least half a dozen drugs, including colon cancer treatments Cyramza, from Eli Lilly & Co, and Stivarga, sold by Bayer AG, aren't worth prices that can exceed $100,000 a year, top cancer specialists said in interviews with Reuters. If specialists do start considering a drug's cost in their prescribing habits, such decisions could dent the multibillion-dollar cancer drug business of companies from Roche Holding AG to Celgene Corp. Worldwide spending on cancer medicines reached $100 billion in 2014, a year-over-year jump of more than 10 percent.
Limited time offer:
Just RM5 per month.
