UNINSURED PROSTATE CANCER PATIENTS TEND TO HAVE MORE SEVERE DISEASE AT DIAGNOSIS

Uninsured Prostate Cancer Patients Tend To Have More Severe Disease At Diagnosis.

HealthDay (9/17, Preidt) reported that, according to a paper in Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers and Prevention, "prostate cancer patients who are uninsured or on Medicaid at the time of their diagnosis tend to have more severe disease, likely because they have less access to medical care." In fact, "compared to patients with private insurance, those who were uninsured or Medicare-insured had higher PSA levels and Gleason scores, and were more likely to be diagnosed with advanced cancer." Before reaching those conclusions, investigators "analyzed National Cancer Database records of 312,339 prostate cancer patients diagnosed between 2004 and 2006."

        Emory researchers eventually discovered that "uninsured and Medicaid-insured patients had approximately 4 ng/ml higher PSA levels than their privately insured counterparts," MedWire (9/17, Guy) reported. "Furthermore, being uninsured was clearly associated with having an advanced Gleason score, with odds ratios (ORs) of 1.97 and 1.67 for uninsured and Medicaid insured men, respectively, compared with privately insured patients. Being Black, Asian, or Hispanic also increased the risk for poor Gleason score compared with being White," while "being uninsured and Medicaid-insured...increased the risk for being diagnosed with advanced-stage disease, 1.85 and 1.49 times, respectively, compared with being privately insured."