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National spending on health care presents a central fiscal challenge for the United States. Expenditures for cancer care are expected to increase substantially because of a rapid rise in new cancer diagnoses associated with the aging of the population. In addition, innovations in cancer treatment are expected to increase spending on cancer care. To examine the drivers of rising cancer costs and to evaluate potential strategies to provide affordable, high-quality cancer care to all patients, the Institute of Medicine's National Cancer Policy Forum convened a workshop in October 2012, Delivering Affordable Cancer Care in the 21st Century. This article summarizes presentations and discussion from the workshop, and focuses on the practice-changing strategies that workshop speakers proposed to improve the affordability of cancer care while maintaining or improving the quality of care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors discuss the different methods to improve outpatient oncology practice. They outline the findings of the United pilot project published in the "Journal of Oncology Practice" They emphasize the significance of a coordinated definition of patient classifications in the quality improvement efforts for cancer care.

The author discusses the differences between the prices for cancer in a physician's office and he hospital outpatient setting in the U.S. Topics include the efforts to consolidate physician's offices into hospitals, the impact of the 340B drug discount program on the prices of drugs charged by hospitals, and the Part B pilot proposal of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).

In this article the author expresses his views regarding the oncology demonstration project conducted by the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) in 2006 which focused on care process and patient status reporting by treating physicians. He thinks that the data gathered by the proponents were not necessarily what was sought. He criticizes the passiveness of the practicing oncologists regarding the accuracy of staging and disease status information they submitted on claims.