Despite common perceptions, cancer care in Ontario isn’t fully universal. Coverage under the Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP) essentially ends as soon as a patient leaves the hospital. And while some supplementary programs (such as the aforementioned Trillium program and the Ontario Drug Benefit Program (ODB) for seniors, both of which require a rather arduous application process) cover prescription drug costs for patients over 65 and under a certain income cutoff, many in between may find themselves getting squeezed.
But the problem isn’t simply about money: self-administering cancer treatments at home often leaves patients struggling to cope with side effects and scrambling to find answers for an endless list of questions about safe storage and handling, proper dosage and possible drug interactions. And while hospital and cancer centre pharmacists are specially trained on the cancer drugs they administer to patients, the same unfortunately cannot always be said of the local community pharmacists who are increasingly finding themselves tasked with filling prescriptions for these new, at-home treatments.
Full article at: National Post