Out of Pocket Cost Communication in Multiple Sclerosis Patients

Patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) spend a substantial amount on healthcare services (total lifetime cost of $4.1 million), and rank second behind congestive heart failure in direct all-cause medical costs for chronic conditions. Among medically bankrupt families, MS is reported to be associated with the highest out-of-pocket expenditure (mean $34,167) followed by diabetes, injuries, stroke, mental illness, and heart disease. With increased costs of MS disease-modifying therapies (DMTs) over the last 20 years, relatively higher out-of-pocket (OOP) costs for advanced imaging tests compared to other common essential health benefits, and increased cost sharing, the financial burden on MS patients continues to escalate. More than half of MS patients lose their ability to generate incomes within a decade after diagnosis due to disability. Accordingly, these patients are at high risk for health-related financial toxicity (a term used interchangeably with financial distress or financial burden, first introduced in the oncology literature to report potential economic impact of modern oncology medications). Financial toxicity is defined as a combination of subjective financial concerns (e.g., anxiety), objective financial consequences of health issues and treatments (e.g., decreased income, medical debt, bankruptcy), and patients' coping behaviors. Financial toxicity, as measured by the Comprehensive Score for Financial Toxicity Patient-Reported Outcome (COST), can harm patients' health-related quality of life (HRQOL). Further, the financial burden from high cost-sharing medical services can be a risk factor for treatment non-adherence. To date, there are no published studies measuring financial toxicity in MS patients, and work in other disease states cannot necessarily be generalized to MS patients. First, the economic burden of MS is different from cancer due to early age of disease onset and its progressive disabling course. Additionally, since MS affects people in the most productive stages of their lives, the disease additionally carries important social burdens. Providing patients with resources to proactively manage the costs of their care may help to reduce financial toxicity. However, financial navigation, must be provided in a manner that is acceptable, accessible, less cumbersome, thereby not affecting the flow of clinical care. In order to better understand how to equip patients with tools that have the potential to reduce financial toxicity, there is an urgent need to study interventions at the patient, clinic, payer, and policy level. This is a two-arm, randomized trial with 60 adult MS patients who are receiving disease modifying therapy to test the feasibility of OOP cost communication and optimization through centralized financial navigation and explore its efficacy to reduce financial toxicity and care non-adherence compared to usual care.