Twins with breast cancer – one in the US, the other the UK – compare vastly different experiences – Daily Mail
Identical twins Nancy and Nora Groce ‘just knew’ that one day they’d face breast cancer.
The disease killed their great-grandmother and grandmother, and their mother suffered recurring bouts for nearly 30 years before finally succumbing to the illness.
The sisters share the same DNA – and the same genetic risk.
‘We have a spectacular family history. It felt almos…….
Identical twins Nancy and Nora Groce ‘just knew’ that one day they’d face breast cancer.
The disease killed their great-grandmother and grandmother, and their mother suffered recurring bouts for nearly 30 years before finally succumbing to the illness.
The sisters share the same DNA – and the same genetic risk.
‘We have a spectacular family history. It felt almost inevitable,’ says Nora.
It was Nancy who was first diagnosed and treated, when she was 42, in 1994.
Nora discovered she had the disease in 2012, and then, in 2015, Nancy was diagnosed for a second time.
For a while they were undergoing treatment simultaneously.
Yet although they each would receive what they describe as ‘excellent’ care at highly regarded teaching hospitals, their experiences would dramatically diverge.
Both American by birth, Nancy lives between New York and Washington, while Nora’s home for almost 14 years has been London.
And so while Nora, a professor in epidemiology at University College London, received free care through the NHS, she could only watch as Nancy, a government adviser, had to balance gruelling treatment with negotiating mounting medical bills with her health insurance provider – which was branded ‘more stressful than the cancer itself’.
Both sisters, now 69, are in remission. But their story gives a fascinating insight into what it’s like to get cancer treatment in two remarkably different healthcare systems.
While Nora Groce (pictured), a professor in epidemiology at University College London, received free care through the NHS, she could only watch as Nancy, a government adviser, had to balance gruelling treatment with negotiating mounting medical bills with her health insurance provider – which was branded ‘more stressful than the cancer itself’
‘I was a single woman with no partner to help me,’ recalls Nancy. ‘Yet here I was alone, facing a life-threatening disease, and having to deal with bills from doctors, hospitals and labs.’
Nancy, like most Americans, has private health insurance, paying about £3,000 a year for ‘a very good’ package.
But in the end the plan didn’t cover all of her treatment.
‘I ended up paying more than $14,000 [£10,000] out of my own pocket,’ she says.
At one point Nancy was ‘mistakenly’ handed a bill for $40,000 – roughly £30,000 – and although she ultimately didn’t have to pay this, she says that the stress it caused at the time was ‘traumatic’.
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