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The National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF) spent Ksh 1.36 billion in the financial year 2017/ 2018 as payment towards treatment for cancer, an increase of 11 percent from Ksh1.23 billion spent within the same period in the previous year.
The Fund latest utilization report indicates that in the last five years, NHIF has steadily increased its care benefit packages from two to over ten.
The NHIF Oncology Cancer treatment package is one of the packages which has seen thousands of families save millions of shillings in hospital bills both in Kenya and abroad, given that cancer is one of the most expensive diseases to treat.
Data from Afya Smiles Kenya, a premier health website, estimates the costs of chemotherapy to be between Ksh10,000 andKsh82,000 per session in a public hospital, and Ksh35,000 to Ksh500,000 per session in private hospitals.
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On average, a patient can spend over Ksh 1 million for cancer treatment, but with NHIF active membership, the same patient can have the cardpay for the treatment.
Every day, at least one person is diagnosed with cancer in Kenya and 10 people weekly.
Statistics further show that over10,000 people travel abroad each year to seek treatment, and amongst those, a staggering 70 percent are going to seek cancer treatment
”NHIF thus strives to continually review its benefit packages and organize them towards providing support to all its members. These benefit packages aim to provide financial risk protection,” says Mr Nicodemus Odongo, the NHIF Acting Chief ExecutiveOfficer.
Data from the Kenya Cancer network estimates that there are 40,000 new cases of cancer each year, with more than 27,000 deaths per year in Kenya.
The network estimates that about 60 percent of those affected by cancer are younger than 70 years old. The leading cancers in women are breast and cervical, while among men, prostate and esophageal cancers are most prominent.
A 2018 report by the World Health Organisation (WHO) indicates that prostate cancer deaths in Kenya stood at 2,309 or 0.82 percent of total deaths, a death rate of 32.72 per 100,000, ranking the country at number 24 in the world.
Cervical cancer deaths in the country were recorded at 2, 706, which is 0.96 percent of total deaths. The report put the death rate at 23.39 per 100,000, ranking the country at position 19 in the world.
Most cancer patients enrolled with NHIF get access to treatment as the Fund pays for chemotherapy, radiotherapy, surgery and even diagnostic tests, such as MRIs and CT scans.
For a member to get services like radiotherapy or chemotherapy, he or she must first seek authorization from the NHIF before treatment commences.
This involves having a form filled in by the attending doctors, specifying the therapy to bead ministered, total sessions needed and the medicines to be given.
Currently, the NHIF care package entails up to 10 chemotherapy sessions, oral and injectable anti-cancers drugs, inpatient and outpatient oncology services, 20 sessions for radio therapy, and up to two sessions for Brachy therapy for advanced cancer, per year.
Among the health facilities that offer the package include some level five and six hospitals, and selected private hospitals in urban centres.
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