Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act

Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act to require that health plans provide coverage for a minimum hospital stay for mastectomies, lumpectomies, and lymph node dissection for the treatment of breast cancer and coverage for secondary consultations.

In January 1997, representative Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut sponsored H.R. 135, the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 1997, in the 105th Congress. The bill tried to "amend the Public Health Service Act and Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 to ask that group and individual health insurance coverage and group health plans furnish coverage for a minimum hospital stay for mastectomies and lymph node dissections executed for the treatment of breast cancer." Among other provisions, the suggested law mandated that the welfares of patients covered under group insurance plans not be confined "for any hospital length of stay in connection with a mastectomy for the treatment of breast cancer to less than 48 hours.

This bill was never conveyed to the floor for a ballot after its introduction to Congress. It was brought up to various congressional committees, where it faded without action until it expired with the end of the 105th Congress. Rep. DeLauro sponsored the same bill five more times: as H.R. 116 to the 106th Congress in January 1999 (the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 1999), as H.R. 536 to the 107th Congress in February 2001 (the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 2001), as H.R. 1886 to the 108th Congress in April 2003 (the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 2003), as H.R. 1849 (the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 2005) to the 109th Congress in April 2005, and as H.R. 119 (the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 2007) to the 110th Congress in January 2007. In each case, the bill's destiny was the same: it was brought up to committees and exited without being brought to a ballot. In September 2008 the House finally took up H.R. 758 (a revised edition of the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 2007, which had been introduced 21 months earlier) and authorized it; but the bill was not approved by the Senate before the end of the 110th Congress.

The Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act passed the House last year by a vote of 421-2. The legislation would permit a woman and her doctor to choose whether she should recuperate from a mastectomy or lumpectomy for at least 48 hours in the hospital or whether she has enough support to get quality care at home. This is a bill in the U.S. Congress originating in the House of Representatives (”H.R.”). A bill must be passed by both the House and Senate and then be signed by the President before it becomes law. Bill numbers resume from 1 every two years. Each two-year cycle is called a session of Congress. This bill was created in the 111th Congress, in 2009-2010.