Many financial support services are available to patients at the ACC, but are offered by different umbrella departments and rely on self- or clinician-referrals. Financial Advocacy provides assistance with insurance benefits, copayment assistance and hospital-based financial support. Social work assists with costs not directly related to treatment and also connects patients with community resources. Programs that increase coordination between these departments and proactively screen patients for financial hardship may enhance the reach of available services. However, such programs are resource intensive. As such, obtaining a better understanding of their benefits and any barriers to their expansion is a necessary first step to their broader implementation.~The long-term goal is to implement evidence-based practices that reduce ACC patients' financial burden. The overall objective of this proposal is to develop and evaluate a coordinated financial navigation program at the ACC for patients with multiple myeloma and identify barriers to its broader implementation. The rationale is that understanding the program's effectiveness and any barriers to its scalability will guide the way in which it could be incorporated into existing ACC workflows to maximize benefit for patients.
The study is a randomized controlled trial to develop and evaluate a coordinated financial navigation program at the Abramson Cancer Center (ACC) for patients with multiple myeloma and identify barriers to its broader implementation.