Breast, Cervical, and Lung Cancer: A comparison of Real Healthcare Costs and INA-CBGs Rates in the Era of National Health Insurance

Background: In Indonesia, the cost of cancer treatment has been determined by the Indonesian Case Base Groups (INA-CBGs) based on a code called the INA-CBG’s rates. However, a fair claim should be based on the severity of the disease and the class of treatment in the hospital, not on the rates of code. In fact, the real cost of therapy for cancer is influenced by several factors including stage, comorbidity, and severity (INA-CBGs coding, type of hospital, hospital class, treatment grade, side effects, and length of stay), so in many cases, there are reported differences between the real costs and the INA-CBGs rates charged to patients. Objective: This study aims to investigate the difference between real treatment costs and INA-CBG’s rates for cases of lung cancer, cervical cancer, and breast cancer at a cancer center hospital in Indonesia. Methods: This work uses an observational study, and the data were taken retrospectively from hospital financial data and patient medical records. The data were then analyzed using a one-sample t-test to determine the difference between real costs and INA-CBGs costs. Results: The results showed that there was no significant difference between real costs and INA-CBG’s cost on stage II lung cancer treatment in grade 2 with a sig. value of 0.683; code C-4-13-II in grade 3 with a sig. value of 0.151; and code C-4-13-III in grade 3 with a sig. value of 0.650; where the significance level (t alpha) is more than 0.05. Furthermore, the treatment costs for cervical cancer with codes C-4- 13-I and C-4-13-II in grade 1 had sig. values of 0.155 and 0.720 respectively. Lastly, the treatment cost for breast cancer patients with codes C-4-12-II in grade 3 had a sig. value of 0.145 and code C-4-13-II in grade 3 showed a sig. value of 0.091. (AU)

Pharmacy students' empathy and its determinants: a systematic review.

Background: Empathy in the context of healthcare is an immersion experience to comprehend patients' viewpoints, feelings, and emotions, without passing judgment, to ensure they receive the necessary treatment to feel comfortable. Empathy for others must be possessed by healthcare professionals and healthcare students as healthcare professionals' candidates, including the pharmacy student. This study aimed to identify and assess the determinants related to pharmacy students' empathy. Methods: Three electronic databases were used for the first searches. We used peer-reviewed original papers, full text, must assess determinants that are associated with pharmacy students' empathy, and only be focused on pharmacy students (first to the fourth year) as healthcare professionals candidates. We utilized Joanna Briggs Institute Critical Appraisal Checklists to observe the quality of published publications and reduce bias. Results: This review examined 14 papers that reported on determinants connected to pharmacy students' empathy. Nine studies evaluated the association between gender or sex and the level of empathy, seven studies reported educational intervention, four studies discussed the year of study, two studies explained the type of school, four studies evaluated experience, and others determinants that discussed in the included studies were career preference, intercultural sensitivity, stigma, altruism, grit, self-awareness, marital status, and family income Conclusions: Educational intervention, experience, gender or sex, type of school, year of study, intercultural sensitivity, career preference, altruism, grit, self-awareness, marital status, and family income, can all have a positive impact on increased empathy among pharmacy students. We acknowledge that the included studies are heterogeneous, indicating that additional studies are necessary before reaching any firm conclusions. More research is needed to properly understand how empathy can be improved with the most effective pharmacy educational strategies. Higher levels of evidence are also required in studies to address the potential bias caused using self-report questionnaires, as well as other potential biases and inaccuracies.