AICC formed to provide access to the highest quality, integrated care to patients with cancer

Sep 2 2009

A nationwide collection of multi-specialty physician group practices and industry partners have formed an informal coalition aimed at promoting and protecting the fundamental right of patients with cancer to access an integrated and comprehensive program of diagnosis, treatment, comfort and support of the highest quality. Access to Integrated Cancer Care (AICC) will champion a multi-disciplinary approach to cancer care that brings together physicians from across specialties who are committed to diagnosing, staging and providing definitive or palliative treatment for cancer patients.

"Cancer patients have the right to treatment that produces the best possible outcomes, and it is the responsibility of physicians and government to work together to create care systems that guarantee that right," said the Chairman of AICC's Executive Board, Dr. Deepak A. Kapoor. "AICC's goal is simple — to preserve access to the highest quality, integrated care to patients with cancer."

Dr. Kapoor noted that through AICC, 35 multi-disciplinary physician group practices, comprising 875 specialists committed to caring for patients stricken with cancer, along with industry leaders that provide critical services and technologies to help deliver the most effective treatments to these patients, have lent their voice to communicate to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) the dramatic, adverse impact that recent proposals by CMS, if finalized, would have on the delivery of cancer care. The physician practices supporting this effort range in size from nine to 102 physicians and are located in 18 states drawn from every region of the country. They furnish care in urban and suburban settings, and many of the physician practices serve patients in rural communities.

Dr. Kapoor emphasized AICC's commitment to working with legislators and regulators on the state and national levels to curb over-utilization of health care services while preserving patient access to comprehensive cancer care in the multi-specialty physician group practice setting.

http://www.cms.hhs.gov