"I was looking at [cancer] patients who were having to decide whether to buy food or pay a copay. ...

... New Mexico is a poor state — a lot of people who live way below the poverty line. Cancer patients are two times as likely as other patients to go bankrupt.... Every time a [cancer] patient ends up in the hospital [which is 32% to 53% of the time they go to an ER], their quality of life permanently goes down....The hospitals hate our guts. If you have complications from cancer, a trip to the ER could save your life. But the best way to prevent readmissions is to prevent admissions."

— Barbara McAneny, M.D., a radiation oncologist and CEO of New Mexico Cancer Center in Albuquerque, N.M., told attendees at a recent National Value-Based Payment Summit in San Francisco sponsored by Global Health Care, LLC.