Connie Mack: “I am pleased to join Senator Rockefeller today as we introduce legislation to provide Medicare patients fighting cancer…”

“I am pleased to join Senator Rockefeller today as we introduce legislation to provide Medicare patients fighting cancer with coverage of benefits when they participate in approved clinical trials. Under current law, Medicare will not generally pay for the costs of patient care if they are participating in clinical trials. Beneficiaries are denied access to clinical trials of promising new therapies because Medicare deems these therapies experimental, and therefore not qualified for coverage. This means cancer patients who are Medicare beneficiaries essentially have two choices when they have exhausted all traditional cancer therapies--either pay the costs of participating in a clinical trial themselves, or go without additional treatment. For all but the most wealthy beneficiaries, it is too cost-prohibitive to take part in a clinical trial. Clinical trials are one of the most effective ways the Federal Government has of determining which treatments are most effective. Yet, researchers have told me they have difficulty accruing the required number of patients to participate in the trials they are conducting. Researchers have identified noncoverage by Medicare and private insurers as one of the primary reasons why patients do not participate in clinical trials.”