Purchasing corporate healthcare 

Following on from the launch of the publication "Purchasing corporate healthcare: Making informed purchasing decisions on cancer" (see below), Mercer and Cancerbackup* have again teamed up to produce this "Covering cancer: Survey of corporate healthcare/Private Medical Insurance (PMI) providers" report as the next phase of supporting the purchase of appropriate cancer cover as part of PMI arrangements.

The purpose of this report is to provide a critical and comparative review, assessing each PMI provider’s main corporate PMI policy for cancer, including issues such as scope and standard of cover, treatments that are included within the cover and access to cancer cover.

*In April 2008 Cancerbackup merged with Macmillan Cancer Support in order to better meet the needs of people affected by cancer.

This is the actual report:

Cancerbackup and the Working with Cancer group have produced a guide for companies on purchasing Private Medical Insurance (PMI) to ensure that employers know exactly what they are buying and how well their employees will be covered.

The guide, sponsored by Mercer, a leading global provider of consulting, outsourcing and investment services, and supported by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) and the Association of British Insurers (ABI) aims to help employers make informed purchasing decisions on cancer coverage and get the best cover available for their workforce.

A review of private medical insurance policies for cancer care

In August 2004, Cancerbackup undertook a review of private medical insurance (PMI) policies for cancer care. The subsequent report, Covering Cancer, showed that consumers are being given misleading information by some PMI sales staff about the extent of cancer coverage provided by their organisation’s policies. In some cases, they are telling consumers that treatments for incurable cancer are covered when the same company told us in our survey that they are not covered.

Most PMI companies are struggling to come to terms with modern cancer treatments designed to shrink the cancer, stabilise it or slow the spread of the disease with the hope of prolonging life. As a result, PMI companies are not clear about whether they will cover these therapies or not. At the time of Cancerbackup's report, most PMI policies do not cover people throughout the entire course of their cancer.

Cancerbackup continues to work with the insurance industry to improve openness and transparency about the extent of coverage for cancer so that consumers can make an informed choice when purchasing private medical insurance.

Full report

Press release

• Private health insurers failing to cover vital cancer treatment and misleading consumers, says CancerBACUP, 25 August 2004