국내 요양병원에서 시행되는 암치료 관련 비급여 진료항목에 대한 고찰 = A Study on the Uninsured Medical Care Items Related to Cancer Treatment in Geriatric Hospital in South Korea

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Backgrounds : Cancer patients are increasing in South Korea as well as in the world. The number of Geriatric hospitals for treatment and rehabilitation after surgery, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy in cancer patients at tertiary hospitals is gradually increasing. However, there have been no studies on uninsured Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) that are currently administered at Geriatric hospitals.
Methods : After examining the total number of nationwide hospitals registered in the national Health Insurance Review and Assessment service (HIRA), we surveyed the web homepages of all Geriatric hospitals in order to find out what kind of and how many CAM therapies were offered for cancer patients.
Results : As of July 2017, the total number of nursing hospitals registered in HIRA was 1521. By web homepage survey of geriatric hospitals, 86 hospitals offered various CAM treatments for cancer patients. The uninsured treatments in CAM are composed of local hyperthermia therapy, mistletoe, high-dose vitamin C therapy, thymosin-alpha 1, selenium, and vitamin D therapy by frequency.
Conclusions : The CAM therapies in South Korea are popularly integrated with the conventional treatments such as surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation at many geriatric hospitals. The limitations of CAM therapies including adverse effects should be properly informed for cancer patients.