33% of Cancer Patients Living in Provinces Undergo Surgery in Seoul... Gap Widens According to Income

Assemblyman Park Heeseung: "Patient Concentration in Seoul Leads to Decline in Medical Institution Capacity"

One in three cancer patients living outside Seoul undergo surgery at hospitals located in Seoul. In particular, the higher the income level, the higher the proportion of patients heading to Seoul.

According to data received by Park Heeseung, a member of the National Assembly's Health and Welfare Committee from the National Health Insurance Service on the 24th, the total number of cancer surgery patients nationwide across 17 cities and provinces last year was 301,644.

Among them, excluding patients from the Seoul area (52,931), the number of surgery patients from other regions was 248,713, and 32.9% (81,889) of these patients underwent surgery at medical institutions in Seoul, which is not their residential area.

The proportion of patients living outside Seoul who received surgery in Seoul increased by 5.9 percentage points over 15 years, from 27.0% in 2008 to 32.9% last year. By region, Sejong was highest at 49.9%, followed by Jeju at 47.3%, Chungbuk at 45.5%, Gyeonggi at 40.8%, and Gangwon at 40.3%.

The rate of cancer patients receiving surgery in their own residential area (self-sufficiency rate) was 93.4% in Seoul, whereas in regions excluding Seoul, it was only 48.9%, less than half. The region with the lowest self-sufficiency rate was Gyeongbuk at just 13.2%, followed by Sejong at 16.2%, Chungbuk at 30.2%, Chungnam at 33.2%, and Gwangju at 35.2%, ranking among the lowest.

In particular, the higher the income, the higher the proportion of cancer patients receiving surgery at medical institutions located in Seoul. Last year, among cancer patients not living in Seoul, 36.7% of those in the top 20% income bracket (quintile 5) underwent surgery at Seoul medical institutions, compared to 29.0% in the bottom 20% income bracket (quintile 1), which is 7.7 percentage points lower than quintile 5.

The difference between quintile 5 and quintile 1 was even greater in Sejong at 14.6 percentage points, Daejeon at 10.6 percentage points, Gangwon at 10.3 percentage points, and Chungnam at 9.1 percentage points.

Assemblyman Park emphasized, "As the number of cancer patients receiving surgery in local areas decreases, the capabilities of local medical institutions in terms of medical staff skills and financial aspects are likely to decline, which will cause a vicious cycle of concentration in Seoul again. We must expand regional infrastructure so that patients living in local areas can safely receive cancer surgery within their own regions."