If you are the slightest bit squeamish you may not want to read this week’s offering.
Sometimes there are the funny ones (at least I hope they’re humorous). Sometimes they are introspective or inspiring or informative or insightful. But this one is intended to be about a more technological aspect of cancer and it’s management.
We have come to associate "some one with cancer" as that image of the person with the adjacent IV pole getting their periodic doses of intravenous Chemotherapy. Heck, the Cancer Man logo even leverages that look. It is indicative of the infusion delivery system most common for the injection of treatment regimen. For those whose pattern and frequency or duration of infusion is going to be particularly extensive, a port or catheter may be inserted to ease the process and all associated incursions into your veins. Aside from the convenience of the port, it also helps stave off the discomfort of a needle stick each time as well as vein fatigue which can occur from all of the treatments.
Modern science surrounding chemo therapy continually seeks to enhance the efficacy of the drugs as well as the patient reactions or adverse effects of the process. Subcutaneous injection (the fancy term for getting your medicine via a needle), as is the direction that more and more IV infusion drugs are moving. As can be imagined: the process is much faster, the needle can go into the arm or belly (instead of a vein), and an injection is much less invasive or involved than infusion. As could also be imagined, the development of a subcutaneous alternative can be extensive and as such more expensive - the cost of convenience.
And whenever the confluence of cost and convenience cross paths, insurance companies tend to be nearby. At times the recommendation of a generic infusion therapy is the preferred method that is covered. This is in no way a compromise of efficacy or quality of care - just a money matter. And other times, either through the efforts of a persistent physician or the otherwise justifiable benefits of Subcutaneous vs. IV, the subcue (it's medical nickname) wins out.
I have been the beneficiary of the subcue revolution as well as a participant in the bureaucracy of the battle. In some cases we have prevailed over the process and in one recent case, I was switched from subcue to IV. All in all, it's survivable and the meds are working (via either method), but I find it a fascinating subtext running underneath the entire treatment process (like that subtle subcue wordplay there, or are my verbal stylings just getting under your skin?) Gotcha!
