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 Spending more than tripled since 2005 and was highly concentrated
among a small number of cancer centers, said study coauthor Laura B.
Vater of Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis.
In 2014, 20 of those 890 cancer centers, including big names like
Cancer Treatment Centers of America, MD Anderson Cancer Center and
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, accounted for 86 percent of
advertising spending.
Spending on advertising does not necessarily reflect quality of
care, however, the authors note.
“Previous research has shown that cancer center advertisements use
emotion-based techniques to influence viewers and often do not
include information about benefits, risks, or costs of cancer
treatment,” Vater told Reuters Health by email. “There is a concern
among some physicians that such advertising may persuade patients to
pursue high-cost treatments with a low likelihood of improving
outcomes.”
The researchers used data from Kantar Media, which tracks content
and number of advertisements, on cancer center expenditure in
television, magazines, radio, newspapers, billboards and the
internet.
TV accounted for most advertising spending in 2005 and 2014,
increasing from about $40 million to $80 million, but internet
spending saw the greatest relative increase, from $300,000 in 2005
to more than $8 million in 2014, as reported in the JAMA Internal
Medicine research letter.
“With increasing healthcare costs and decreasing reimbursement
rates, healthcare organizations may strive to increase patient
volume for cancer care (a highly profitable clinical service) to
offset declining revenue,” Vater said. “Advertising may be one
strategy used to improve cancer center recognition and attract
patients in an increasingly competitive environment.”
Competition, which is highest in cities like Chicago, Houston, New
York City, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Seattle, and Tampa, may fuel some
of the biggest expenditures, she said.
“It also appears that cancer centers may be competing for patients
outside of their regional markets,” she said. “Cancer centers with
the highest advertising spending in 2014 spent a considerable
proportion of advertising dollars in national media outlets.”
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Ads may make big-name cancer centers look unrealistically good,
giving the impression that a cancer patient who does not go to one
of these centers is making a mistake, said Dr. Steven Woloshin of
the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice in
Lebanon, New Hampshire, who co-authored an editorial alongside the
results.
“The people who these ads are targeting are really vulnerable,” so
it is incumbent on the cancer centers themselves to be responsible,
Woloshin said. Certain ads could give people false hope, or cause
them to leave their local care system unnecessarily, he told Reuters
Health by phone
Patients should remember not to take ads at face value, he said.
Advertising like this is regulated, by the Federal Trade Commission
for for-profit centers and by state attorneys general for nonprofit
centers, but officials usually step in only in response to
complaints, he said.
Academic centers in particular should commit to doing better on
their own, and subject their advertisements to an objective review,
Woloshin said.
“Among the 20 centers with the highest spending in 2014, more than
half were not designated by the National Cancer Institute, and three
were not accredited by the Commission on Cancer,” Vater said. “The
public should be aware that cancer centers spending the most on
advertising may not necessarily provide the highest quality of
cancer care.”
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/29sTfAS JAMA Internal Medicine, online July
11, 2016.
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