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In reference to the general advisory of reducing the chemo for early stage cancer patient, there is an important factor of economics. Doctors and medicine suppliers are making tremendous amount of money from the office visits, infusion center visits, blood tests, red blood cell enhancement shots, allergy/desensitizing shots, chemo itself and other services. If you ever got to see the itemized bills, you would be shocked in how they do their mathematics. Therefore, most doctors' offices do not show you the bills although you are entitled to see them. I asked for their bills and was shocked to see how they had the nerve to charge every single item at such an inflated prices. One infusion could easily amounted to several thousand dollars. Therefore, in spite of the low percentage of efficacy from the chemo treatment, many oncs are advocating the chemo as a standard course of action. I don't want to say this is their primary objective, but the big dollars certainly play a role in the decision making process for some of them. I don't want to say this is necessarily their mission and I sincerely believe they do have their patients health as their primary concern. On the other hand, reducing chemo treatment will certain mean a substantial drop in their earning. All professionals still need to have adequate income to justify their existence. I know many of you will be very critical to my remarks above but this is a very rarely discussed topic, particularly our lives are at stake.
Just some food for thoughts.
Ann
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