The General Assembly finds and declares that:
(1) Whereas, until recently health care insurers covered costs of hospital stays of a patient who had undergone a mastectomy or lymph node dissection until that patient was discharged by a physician. Now some insurers are making mastectomies and lymph node dissections an outpatient procedure and refusing to pay for any hospital inpatient care following the procedure;
(2) There is sufficient scientific data to question the safety and appropriateness of such treatment of breast cancer patients; and
(3) The length of postmastectomy or postlymph node dissection inpatient stay should be a clinical decision made by a physician in agreement with the patient based on the unique characteristics of the patient and the surgery involved.
Section: 33-24-70 33-24-71 33-24-72 NextLast modified: October 14, 2016