Cancer wastes organs, bodies, and lives, but researchers have now identified another way in which the disease harms patients and costs money: it robs them of their time, too. A study published Wednesday, Jan. 3 by the Journal of the National Cancer Institute says that cancer patients lose many hours of time in the waiting room, in line to get a CT scan, and waiting for chemotherapy to finish dripping into their systems.

The number of hours is staggering: "368 hours in that first year after diagnosis with ovarian cancer; 272 hours being treated for lung cancer, 193 hours for kidney cancer," says an article published by the Associated Press.

The cost of all that time comes out to at least $2.3 billion for cancer patients in just their first year of treatment. What's more, the study doesn't include the time that patients spend at home, either recovering from surgery or too weak from treatment to do anything; and it doesn't cover time spent traveling to therapy sessions, doctors' appointment, etc.

The study used data on 11 types of cancer from more than 760,000 cancer patients, covering medical records from the period 1995 to 2001. The cost to the cancer patient in terms of time varied widely depending on the type of cancer, from melanoma and prostate cancer at the lower-cost end of the spectrum to gastric and ovarian cancers.

The study's conclusion: "Patient time costs for cancer care in the United States are substantial and vary by tumor site and phase of care, likely reflecting differences in stage at diagnosis and availability and intensity of treatment."

http://jnci.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/99/1/14