Delays and red tape jeopardize patients’ access to cancer care—even when they have high-quality health insurance, a report from the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS) and Manatt Health finds.

Based on interviews with more than two dozen cancer patients and family members who encountered roadblocks to care, the report, Vital Access: How Policymakers Can Streamline the Cancer Care Journey (29 pages, PDF), found that patients often encounter barriers such as narrow networks, inadequate reimbursement, or unreasonable and burdensome preapproval processes that prevent them from accessing the best care and benefiting from advances in treatment. According to the report, the policy frameworks that govern insurance continue to contribute to systemic inequities that prevent access to high-quality blood cancer care.

“Some groups—including, but not limited to racial and ethnic minority groups, individuals with low income, and rural residents—face substantial social, economic, and environmental disadvantages that hinder or prevent access to the treatment and care they need,” the report states. Medicaid beneficiaries—33 percent and 30 percent of whom are Black and Latinx, respectively—are among those most significantly impacted by disparities in access.

To address such disparities, the report’s authors outline nine policy reform recommendations in five areas: addressing burdens posed by inadequate network standards, eliminating administrative red tape that bars access to treatment, reducing administrative hurdles of seeing out-of-state care, increasing transparency of plan network composition and performance, and elevating patient-facing support for plan selection and navigation of coverage and treatment.

“The good news is there are tools available to plans, providers, and regulators to address many of these continued gaps for individuals that have insurance but are unable to access care,” said Manatt Health director Alex Morin, who co-authored the report. “But it’s clear that we are not taking advantage of them to their fullest potential and as a result, patients and families continue to suffer.”

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