Value of waiving coinsurance for colorectal cancer screening in medicare beneficiaries

Financial barriers to colorectal cancer screening persist despite the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Medicare beneficiaries may face 20 percent coinsurance for a screening colonoscopy when the procedure includes the removal of polyps or follows a positive fecal screening test. Using an established microsimulation model, we estimated that waiving this coinsurance would result in 1.7 fewer colorectal cancer deaths (a decrease of 13 percent) and $17,000 higher colorectal cancer-related costs (an increase of 0.6 percent) for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services per 1,000 sixty-five-year-olds, assuming a 10-percentage-point increase in the rates of first colonoscopy screening, follow-up, and surveillance. If the rates did not change, waiving coinsurance would increase total costs by $51,000 (1.9 percent) per 1,000 sixty-five-year-olds. Estimated screening benefits were comparable when fecal testing was assumed to be the primary screening method. Moreover, waiving coinsurance would be cost-effective if the screening rate increased by 0.6 percentage points, assuming a willingness-to-pay threshold of $50,000 per quality-adjusted life-year gained. Thus, the waiver is likely to have a favorable balance of health and cost impact.

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