City of Hope Cancer Center Chicago — Local services in Zion

I am hoping that since acquiring CTCA that CITY OF HOPE has adapted a new business model from that of CTCA’s to be a more patient centric and compassionate vs CTCA’s money hungry cash cow’s business model. I was diagnosed in 2010 with stage 3B melanoma on my right arm above my elbow. I had an amazing experience for the first 2 yrs of my journey in the care of Dr Levine with CTCA-Chicago campus from 2010-2012. I had 4 surgeries to get clear margins, 1 skin graft taken from my upper thigh area, 14 lymph nodes removed 2 (surgeries), 1 recurrence, Interferon injections 5 days per week/5 months of at-home at the highest dose recommended by the FDA (self-administered therapy since I lived over 200 miles away). CTCA’s commercials during those years said something like “Cancer not quitting and neither did they” WELL, CTCA QUIT ME! I had relocated to NJ with my same employer but need to transfer my care to the Pennsylvania CTCA Hospital. I was informed I had been “blacklisted” for non-payment of a pet scan and therefore could not make an appointment, or transfer care until the previous outstanding bill was paid for in full! Everything should have been paid for as far as I knew. This was a surprise. I had pretty good insurance, BCBS of IN at the time. CTCA had billed every time successfully in the past but on one occasion someone at CTCA had billed a pet scan to the wrong BCBS! It shouldn’t have happened and they should have caught their own error, as they had all my current insurance information. They billed BCBS of OH. I’d never had BCBS of OH. CTCA could not get payment from them - go figure! Instead of alerting me of the issue they turned me over to collections, which they failed to alert me to as well. And it was all due to CTCA’s mistake in billing the wrong insurance provider, and then failing to inform the patient! It took me sometime to figure out what happened. In the mean time my job was then transferring back to IN so I decided just to wait until I got back to IN to chase it anymore, as my follow-up care would have to be with CTCA-Chicago’s Campus going forward. I returned to IN and got to the bottom of the problem. CTCA was apologetic and did re-bill the correct insurance company. Cancer doesn’t wait! So I moved forward. At the time, ironically I worked in Oncology, Clinical Research. I needed a referral. I got the name of a good specialist at IU’s Simon Center, made my appt and never looked back! In 2014 the cancer metastasized to my brain. I had a tumor both in/on my brain the size of two golf balls. I had a craniotomy and 5 rounds of stereotactic radiation. My doctors at Simon Center were brilliant and I enlisted a neurosurgeon from Goodman Campbell Brain & Spine to do my craniotomy. My team of Drs and surgeons were phenomenal! 5 months later it I opted for Gamma Ray Knife Surgery, in lieu of a second craniotomy, and I completed 3 of 4 rounds of Yervoy immunotherapy. Joyously, I’ve been NED since 2015. Unfortunately, brain surgery, radiation and immunotherapy all have systemic forever side effects that have left me handicapped. I am forever grateful for those first two years with a caring oncologist, Dr Levine and his team at CTCA-Chicago campus. I can’t help but wonder how many other people they did that to, how many died? Some years later I saw CTCA’s commercial ad on TV about how CTCA never quit, and it infuriated me! Not because they ran out of treatment options or ideas, nor was I a hard to treat case, NO. They quit/failed me because I had an outstanding pet scan bill! One they mis-billed for! After seeing that TV ad, I sent a letter to Dr Levine telling him of my experience, as I have shared here. He responded, apologized over my ordeal, asked a few questions. He did invite me back, but by that time I was already established with a new ONC team and would not leave them unless necessary. So in closing, I hope COH has cleaned up CTCA-Chicago...

My wife was diagnosed with breast cancer Christmas 2013. It was devastating news, to say the least! Our family felt like we just got a BIG slap by the devil! We decided to take action. She immediately went to her Naturopath, Judy Hinojosa-Sinks, in Chandler, AZ, her primary doctor, who recommended she call CTCA. We found out our BCBS does not cover the Goodyear, AZ Hospital, and was asked if we would travel to Zion, IL where the Main CTCA was founded in the late 1970's? We prayed and felt we should go....After taking a vacation to Hawaii in early Jan. 2014, we went to CTCA in Zion, IL together at the end of January.

The place was beautiful! They greet you like "Ohana" (family). The Care Team that surrounded us (Primary Doctor, Oncologist, Surgeon, Dietician, Naturopath, etc,) was very caring and mapped out a strategy and plan, we agreed to. The Pastoral Care Team, headed by Pastor McCray, was very important to my wife and myself, as we are believers in Jesus Christ, and we valued everyone's positive prayers! The whole Pastoral Care Team, has counseled with us, and encouraged us, and visited with us on many, many occasions. We really appreciate their prayer groups, church services, and impromptu visits in the hallways and byways....

Although the first plan to have a lumpectomy and IORT did not work out, because the tumor was found to be too big, the 2nd plan worked out: 6 chemos to shrink the tumor A Lumpectomy in Aug. 2014 to remove it and preserve the breast 30 + radiation therapies to kill any leftover markers in lymph nodes and surrounding areas At this point my wife is not finished her radiation therapy, she is 75% done. Yes, it is hard, it is depressing, it is monotonous, it is discouraging, there are setbacks, but you know what? She is alive. She is in a battle. People who care about her are praying for her. And I believe this is the place where God lead us to, and we are going to make the best of everyday, that is truly "The Gift of Life".

We have personally met the founder, Mr. Stephenson, and his son, Dr. Stephenson. These are wonderful people who care about people who are battling cancer. That is why they are building the New 6 story Addition to the Hospital so they can bring new cutting edge treatments and house family members closer (than the close by Hotels in the area) in the same wing that the patients are in!

I hear a lot of skeptics say things like, "Don't let them burn you (radiation), or poison you (chemotherapy), or cut you (surgery)!" Well, if the natural way can save your life, then I say "Go for it". But if the natural way kills you sooner, then I don't have anything to say about that, other than, our lives are in the palms of God's hands anyway, if you believe in a "Heavenly Papa"?

I wrote a little song about this place: Zion is a place of singing, Zion is a place of joy. Zion is the dwelling of the Lord. Zion is a place of worship. Zion is a place of praise. Zion is the dwelling of the Lord. So let us go to Cancer Treatment Center of America. Where they never give up hope. Where the patient is the CENTER of care, on their journey to become whole. Whether it's a 2nd or 3rd opinion, where your "Team Care" never quits. And the VICTORY is yours for coming here! And the VICTORY is yours for coming here!

Their ads read "Get a 2nd Opinion, your first step in battling cancer". Well..... All I know, is I hope I don't get cancer myself, but if I do, guess where the FIRST place I am going to go to?

Mahalo nui loa! Ke Akua Malama no Aloha ia oe! (Thank you and may God take care of you with his...

As a stage 4 recurrent cancer patient I understand the fear and hopelessness that we feel, but my experience at CTCA could not have been worse. They prey on our desperation to "sell" their services. I was misinformed from the oncology specialist and nurse navigator that my scans from my local oncologist that had just been completed, would be used for a second opinion. Not only were they not used, I was given three different explanations as to why they couldn't be. CTCA attempted to get approval to do their own scans but of course were denied by our insurance company as they were just done! It was a complete waste of time and hope. The lack of communication between departments is alarming, in fact, the intial flight arrangements were incorrect because the nurse navigator did not communicate to the travel department that we were only staying two days. We didn't learn until we met with a Benefits Rep that they only pay once to fly out a caregiver and were also never informed that we would be responsible for paying for our luggage which was $100 round trip. We were given no schedule after day one, were suppose to receive a call from someone the morning of our second day to advise status of the test requests which didn't happen and was also told by travel I would get a schedule on our first day with our return flight details for Friday or Saturday morning which also never materialized. The doctor I met with the first day agreed to meet me in the second day and simply read verbatim (he had no choice since my scans weren't being used) from my medical reports that were received which I already knew the content of. I had no intention of staying for any kind of treatment nor had committed to do so, but imagine our surprise to learn that while with an benefits associate I was scheduled for chemotherapy on day 5 of a 2 day trip with no schedule in between time ! It appears that protocol is get to get the patient there under false pretenses and the assumption is made that we will simply stay, no questions asked. We arrived late on a Wednesday evening and after our meeting with the doctor Friday at noon I had to call the travel department to have arrangements made to get a return flight home Friday night. I will say that the staff was very kind but competence is far more important and it is...