Regulatory legal regulation of the organization and financial provision of supportive therapy for oncological diseases and directions for its optimization

The potential benefits of supportive care offer patients more than many “palliative” methods of anti-tumor treatment. It should be regarded as a necessary part of comprehensive disease therapy rather than just an additional service. However, the imperfection of regulatory and organizational issues, including financial support, limits patients’ access to supportive therapy.

Aim. To analyze regulatory legal documents governing the organization and financial provision of supportive therapy for oncological diseases and identify areas for optimization.

Materials and methods. Content analysis and comparative legal analysis. The content analysis method was applied to 26 directly regulating various organizational aspects of medical care, including oncological diseases from 2012 to the present. In regulatory legal acts, the issues of organization and financing of supportive therapy for oncological diseases were specifically analyzed in terms of how well this area of medical care is regulated.

Results. The current fundamental regulatory legal acts governing the organization and financial provision of supportive therapy for oncological diseases and controlling the quality of the provided medical care contain almost no clear provisions that specify practical issues related to supportive therapy.

Conclusion. The absence of an officially established definition of “supportive therapy” within the Russian healthcare system and the lack of clear distinctions between the terms “medical rehabilitation” and “palliative care” lead to misunderstanding about the importance of this area in comprehensive oncological therapy. This results in uncertainty in organizational and financial matters. To optimize regulatory oversight, ‘supportive therapy’ should become an integral component of modern oncological disease management, implying both interdisciplinary cooperation and a transparent financial system, the adequacy of which will depend on what is included in this concept.