The Healthway Cancer Care Hospital (HCCH) said it aims to expand its hospital beds to 75 this year to assist more cancer patients in minimizing hospital costs amid medical inflation.
“We should be, roughly, by the end of the year, maybe 75 beds already,” HCCH Chief Operating Officer Manuel Francisco “Ramy” T. Roxas told BusinessWorld in an interview.
“Many of our treatments is outpatient… So, the inpatient beds are really for surgical patients,” he added. “Our goal is to lower the out-of-pocket expenses of the patient.”
According to the Philippine Cancer Society (PCS), the country logs over 150,000 new cancer cases annually. Breast and cervical cancer affect most Filipinos, with 27,000 and 7,200 cases detected respectively, per year.
As many Filipinos grapple with the life-threatening disease, the Perpetual Help Medical Center – Las Piñas (PHMC-LP) said that 40.6% of cancer patients’ families face financial strain due to high treatment costs.
The PHMC-LP noted that the cost of cancer treatment in the Philippines ranges from P120,000 to over P1 million, with the mean out-of-pocket expenses reaching P181,789.00.
With government benefits and a Health Maintenance Organization (HMO) card, Mr. Roxas said patients roughly pay 50% of the treatment from their own pockets. To help ease the financial burden, HCCH offers treatment packages for surgery and chemotherapy.
“We look at what’s out there in the hospitals, and we always try to be cheaper than them without losing profitability,” said Mr. Roxas. “If you’re talking about the big ones [hospital], we are 15 to 20% cheaper.”
The hospital’s network with other pharmaceutical companies also helps maintain cheaper treatment costs as the Middle East war fuels medical inflation.
“What’s difficult with cancer treatment, when there’s a new medicine which has proven to be effective, the cost of that medicine also increases,” he said.
“We negotiate with them, we work with them to try to bring down the acquisition cost of these drugs so that we can also offer them cheaper to our patients, no matter how expensive they are,” he added.
HCCH is the first cancer specialty hospital in the Philippines, and is part of the Healthway Medical Network Inc. under Ayala Corporation’s AC Health.
AC Health’s pharmaceutical portfolio includes Generika, St. Joseph Drug, IE Medica, and MedEthix.
“All of this allows us to weather this crisis better,” said Mr. Roxas. “Our drug importation arm will be able to access drugs, and they already do from India, from China, which makes it cheaper for our patients.”
In March, the Department of Health (DoH) launched the National Cancer Grid. The flagship framework aims to standardize cancer care across regions, integrate data silos, and ensure that no Filipino is left behind.
Health Secretary Teodoro J. Herbosa said the government aims to increase screening, diagnosis, and treatment by 50% by 2028. — Almira Louise S. Martinez
