Cancer Treatment in America

I married a rock star.

In actual fact, I was newly married to my best friend, who just so happened to have signed a major record deal. So, rock star.

I, meanwhile, had a great job managing quality improvement at a leading healthcare system.

We were young and we had big dreams together. Our plan was to move to Oregon, me to attend medical school, and my husband to go on tour.

But I had a secret.

My diagnosis

We had just quit our jobs.

As we were packing our final boxes, I received a call about some recent lab results. Sitting there among the moving boxes and packing tape, I was told I had cervical cancer.

For over five years, I had been battling complications from HPV. Back then, we knew a lot less about HPV than we do today. We knew it was a sexually transmitted disease, that it was one letter away from the incurable HIV, and that it caused cervical cancer. And apparently, my number was up.

Our drive westward was supposed to symbolize a drive toward a new life for two newlyweds, two young professionals, two people who had figured out their lives. Instead, our drive to Oregon was a metaphor for the windy road our lives were about to follow, full of questions but no answers.

How long had I had cancer?

Was I dying?

Was it my fault?

Unfortunately for me, I was diagnosed with cancer the day I lost my health insurance.

Life without health insurance

As a healthcare administrator in my previous career, I quickly learned two things.

One, health care is exuberantly expensive and there’s no way to access it without health insurance. And two, most health systems offered access to certain services when you can’t afford them.

With those two things at the forefront of my mind, I quickly found my local breast and cervical cancer program. I knew most academic medical centers had a free clinic that would screen you and treat you for breast or cervical cancer.

“You don’t qualify”

About a month after we settled into our new home, I went to the Free Friday event to present my case.

“Hi, I’m Torrie. I’ve been diagnosed with cervical cancer. I don’t have a job anymore and I need treatment.”

A social worker quickly sat me down and told me that, unfortunately, the way this law actually worked was that they couldn’t treat everybody who was unemployed or unable to pay for treatment. Treatments were available only to those people diagnosed with cervical cancer from the program itself.

In short, I didn’t qualify. I was still insured when I received my diagnosis. And now, I had no way to get treatment.

Getting practical

Normally, I consider myself a planner. But I had no plan for this.

I assumed I was going to get treatment, and then be done. After all, my husband and I had dreams! Cancer wasn’t part of our plan.

So I got practical. I got a job and set aside the idea of medical school until the cancer was gone.

I learned that if you get a job at the federal government, you get health insurance on your first day of work. To me, health insurance was all that mattered. I had cancer and I needed it treated. So I started teaching tax law for the federal government.