Findings from Tufts Medical Center Has Provided New Information about Cancer (“Nothing Is as Great a Learning Experience as Getting a $15,000 Bill”A Mixed-Methods Study of Young Adult Cancer Survivors’ Experience With Insurance Coverage): Cancer

2026 APR 01 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at NewsRx Policy and Law Daily -- A new study on Cancer is now available. According to news reporting out of Boston, Massachusetts, by NewsRx editors, research stated, “To explore long-term young adult (YA) cancer survivors’ experience with health insurance in a post-Affordable Care Act (ACA) era. This was a mixed-methods analysis of insurance-related data collected from a cohort of English-speaking YA (currently age 18-39 years) blood cancer survivors, 3 years from diagnosis, recruited from six US hospitals as part of a financial navigation interventional study (ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT05620979).”

Our news journalists obtained a quote from the research from Tufts Medical Center, “Participants completed baseline questionnaires, with a subset participating in semistructured interviews after the 6-month study period. Summary statistics were reported for survey responses. Qualitative interviews were coded using directed content analysis. A total of 130 long-term (median, 10 [IQR, 6-16] years from diagnosis) YA survivors were enrolled, and 45 participated in interviews. Among the total cohort, most (63%) had employer-based private insurance; 22% had public insurance through Medicaid. Eighteen percent reported seeking a new health insurance plan in the past year to afford survivorship care. Over a fifth (23%) reported not knowing how to seek help navigating insurance, while 30% reported delaying or forgoing survivorship care because of not understanding their insurance plan. Four themes emerged from the interviews: (1) Many YA survivors experience insurance churn (ie, moving between plans or between insured and uninsured status); (2) learning to navigate the insurance system is confusing and not straightforward; (3) interactions related to insurance coverage are time-consuming and stressful; and (4) insurance churn and/or out-of-pocket costs affect YAs’ ability to receive optimal medical care. Ongoing insurance-related challenges persist for YA cancer survivors in a contemporary post-ACA era.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “Although the ACA has provided essential coverage for many patients, ongoing issues include excessive insurance churn, lack of navigation resources, and the continued financial burden of out-of-pocket costs.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: “Nothing Is as Great a Learning Experience as Getting a $15,000 Bill”A Mixed-Methods Study of Young Adult Cancer Survivors’ Experience With Insurance Coverage. JCO Oncology Practice, 2025;22(3):445-454. JCO Oncology Practice can be contacted at: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Two Commerce Sq, 2001 Market St, Philadelphia, PA 19103, USA.

Our news journalists report that additional information may be obtained by contacting Rachel Murphy-Banks, Division of Hematology and Oncology and Institute for Clinical Research and Health Policy Studies, Tufts Medical Center, Boston, MA. Additional authors for this research include Daniel J. Zheng, Angie Mae Rodday, Qingyan Xiang, Nadine Linendoll, Melissa Beauchemin, Timothy J. D. Ohlsen, Emma Fleisher, Kimberly A. Miller, David R. Freyer, Howland E. Crosswell, Randall Y. Chan, Michael E. Roth and Susan K. Parson.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.1200/op-24-01075. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

Publisher contact information for the journal JCO Oncology Practice is: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Two Commerce Sq, 2001 Market St, Philadelphia, PA 19103, USA.

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