Health News
- Former Smokers Get Newly Funded Scan For Lung Cancer And Encourage Others To Do The Same, After Finding Cancer In Time
The number of smokers choosing to get low-dose CT scans to see if they have lung cancer is steadily increasing, especially since this screening was recently approved for payment by Medicare, Grace Schneider reports for The Courier-Journal. Janet Overman...
- Medicare To Pay For Ct Scans Of People At High Risk Of Lung Cancer
Medicare will now pay for low-dose CT scans for people at high risk of getting lung cancer, a change welcomed by officials in Kentucky, which leads the nation in lung cancer and deaths from it. "This is an important new Medicare preventive benefit since...
- Lung Cancer Gets Much Less Research Funding Than Other Cancers, But Is Deadlier, Especially In Kentucky
Lung cancer takes more lives annually than breast, prostate, and colon cancers combined, but the disease "generally doesn't get the public attention or research dollars in proportion to its lethality," Arielle Densen, co-founder of Lung Cancer Free...
- Kentucky Gets A $7 Million Grant To Improve Survival Rates For Lung Cancer, In Which It Leads The Nation
The University of Kentucky, the University of Louisville and the Lung Cancer Alliance have joined in a unique project called Kentucky LEADS (Lung Cancer, Education, Awareness, Detection, Survivorship) Collaborative to assess new approaches for identifying...
- Mcconnell Seeks 'timely And Fair Review' Of Plan For Medicare Coverage Of Ct Scans For Those At High Risk For Lung Cancer
U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell asked Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Marilyn Tavenner to "give a timely and fair review to determine whether low-dose computerized tomography (CT) scans should be covered by Medicare for patients...
Health News
Medicare plans to pay for lung-cancer screening, a boon to Ky.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services plan to start paying for lung cancer screening with low-dose CT scans for people at high risk.
Spiral CT (computed tomography), which is used to look for lung cancer, is a low-dose form of X-ray that delivers about the same radiation as a mammogram, Maggie Fox reports for NBC News.
?I think after a long effort to get to this point, CMS got it right,? Laurie Fenton Ambrose, president and CEO of the Lung Cancer Alliance, told Fox. ?This has the potential of being one of the most significant cancer mortality-reducing efforts to date. We are finally focusing on what is a quarter of all cancer, and that?s lung cancer.?
Fox reports, "Experts project that the screening test, which costs $250-$300, may prevent as many as 20 percent of future deaths from lung cancer, making it akin to mammograms and colonoscopies in terms of saving lives."
The proposal covers people aged 55-74 who have smoked at least a pack a day for 30 years, or the equivalent. It is now open for a 30-day comment period.
Lung cancer is especially deadly because it usually doesn?t cause symptoms until it?s already spread to other parts of the body. Kentucky has more cases of lung cancer than any other state, and its lung cancer mortality rate is nearly 50 percent higher than the national average. This year alone, 3,500 Kentuckians will die from lung cancer. Nationally, it kills nearly 160,000 people a year, according to the American Cancer Society.
Concerns about using CT scans to screen for ling cancer are that it isn't cheap, it isn't harmless, and the scans aren't always clear, often causing patients to endure further needless testing, Fox reports: "The national lung screening trial showed that for every five to six lives saved by screening, one person died because of procedures done after screening, including surgery and biopsies that collapsed the lung."
Spiral CT (computed tomography), which is used to look for lung cancer, is a low-dose form of X-ray that delivers about the same radiation as a mammogram, Maggie Fox reports for NBC News.
?I think after a long effort to get to this point, CMS got it right,? Laurie Fenton Ambrose, president and CEO of the Lung Cancer Alliance, told Fox. ?This has the potential of being one of the most significant cancer mortality-reducing efforts to date. We are finally focusing on what is a quarter of all cancer, and that?s lung cancer.?
Fox reports, "Experts project that the screening test, which costs $250-$300, may prevent as many as 20 percent of future deaths from lung cancer, making it akin to mammograms and colonoscopies in terms of saving lives."
The proposal covers people aged 55-74 who have smoked at least a pack a day for 30 years, or the equivalent. It is now open for a 30-day comment period.
Lung cancer is especially deadly because it usually doesn?t cause symptoms until it?s already spread to other parts of the body. Kentucky has more cases of lung cancer than any other state, and its lung cancer mortality rate is nearly 50 percent higher than the national average. This year alone, 3,500 Kentuckians will die from lung cancer. Nationally, it kills nearly 160,000 people a year, according to the American Cancer Society.
Concerns about using CT scans to screen for ling cancer are that it isn't cheap, it isn't harmless, and the scans aren't always clear, often causing patients to endure further needless testing, Fox reports: "The national lung screening trial showed that for every five to six lives saved by screening, one person died because of procedures done after screening, including surgery and biopsies that collapsed the lung."
That calls for caution. ?We strongly advise older current and former heavy smokers to speak with their doctors about whether CT lung cancer screening is right for them,? Dr. Ella Kazerooni, chair of the American College of Radiology Lung Cancer Screening Committee, told Fox. ?If they and their doctor decide that screening is warranted, we encourage patients to seek out an ACR lung cancer screening center.?
- Former Smokers Get Newly Funded Scan For Lung Cancer And Encourage Others To Do The Same, After Finding Cancer In Time
The number of smokers choosing to get low-dose CT scans to see if they have lung cancer is steadily increasing, especially since this screening was recently approved for payment by Medicare, Grace Schneider reports for The Courier-Journal. Janet Overman...
- Medicare To Pay For Ct Scans Of People At High Risk Of Lung Cancer
Medicare will now pay for low-dose CT scans for people at high risk of getting lung cancer, a change welcomed by officials in Kentucky, which leads the nation in lung cancer and deaths from it. "This is an important new Medicare preventive benefit since...
- Lung Cancer Gets Much Less Research Funding Than Other Cancers, But Is Deadlier, Especially In Kentucky
Lung cancer takes more lives annually than breast, prostate, and colon cancers combined, but the disease "generally doesn't get the public attention or research dollars in proportion to its lethality," Arielle Densen, co-founder of Lung Cancer Free...
- Kentucky Gets A $7 Million Grant To Improve Survival Rates For Lung Cancer, In Which It Leads The Nation
The University of Kentucky, the University of Louisville and the Lung Cancer Alliance have joined in a unique project called Kentucky LEADS (Lung Cancer, Education, Awareness, Detection, Survivorship) Collaborative to assess new approaches for identifying...
- Mcconnell Seeks 'timely And Fair Review' Of Plan For Medicare Coverage Of Ct Scans For Those At High Risk For Lung Cancer
U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell asked Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Marilyn Tavenner to "give a timely and fair review to determine whether low-dose computerized tomography (CT) scans should be covered by Medicare for patients...