Close X
Saturday, November 2, 2024
ADVT 
Tech

Now, a tool to predict financial pain from cancer

Darpan News Desk IANS, 22 Jun, 2014 12:43 PM
  • Now, a tool to predict financial pain from cancer

Along with distress that comes with cancer diagnosis and the discomfort of treatment, more patients now have to deal with "financial toxicity", the expense, anxiety and loss of confidence confronting those who face large, unpredictable costs.


Researchers have now developed a tool to measure a patient's risk for, and ability to tolerate, financial stress that comes with cancer. 

Named COST (Comprehensive Score for financial Toxicity), the tool comprises 11 questions, assembled and refined from conversations with more than 150 patients with advanced cancer.

"A few physicians discuss this increasingly significant side effect with their patients," said Jonas de Souza, head-and-neck cancer specialist at University of Chicago Department of Medicine in the US. 

"We believe that a thoughtful, concise tool that could help predict a patient's risk for financial toxicity might open the lines of communication. This gives us a way to launch that discussion," de Souza added.

Explaining the utility of the tool, he noted, "If patients know what to expect, they may want their physicians to consider less costly medications." 

The findings appeared in the journal Cancer.

MORE Tech ARTICLES

Magnets to power your fridge!

Magnets to power your fridge!
Within a decade, we could be using much more energy-efficient refrigerators than what we have today as researchers have now identified a new “universal” property of metamagnets, unleashing its potential applications for several items of everyday use.

Magnets to power your fridge!

Amazing! 'Gesture' keyboard lets you swipe words in air!

Amazing! 'Gesture' keyboard lets you swipe words in air!
Based partly on sensor technology built for the Microsoft Kinect games, the keyboards of the future could let users manipulate data without sitting down and typing in one letter at a time.

Amazing! 'Gesture' keyboard lets you swipe words in air!

Learn how to limit screen time for kids

Learn how to limit screen time for kids
It is no longer just the television or the computer that young children are glued to these days as smart phones and tablets have made it even more difficult for parents to limit the screen time for their kids.

Learn how to limit screen time for kids

Smart phone can help you shed weight better!

Smart phone can help you shed weight better!
Smart phone applications can help dieters integrate healthy behaviour changes into their daily lives, researchers from University of Missouri (MU) Columbia have revealed.

Smart phone can help you shed weight better!

Now, a pill to test water quality at home!

Now, a pill to test water quality at home!
Want to know if the water you are drinking at home is safe? You could soon test the water quality on your own instead of shipping it into a laboratory as researchers have developed a way to pack the laboratory into a simple pill.

Now, a pill to test water quality at home!

How Twitter can predict social movements in advance

How Twitter can predict social movements in advance
What if we can predict social movements, consumer reactions or even possible outbreaks of epidemics up to two months in advance just by monitoring 50,000 Twitter accounts?

How Twitter can predict social movements in advance