Cancer's second diagnosis is the bill.
Cancer is one of the fastest ways to go broke in America — driven by denials, copays, and drug prices, not the disease itself. OncoQue is being built to fight that side. It isn't running yet: no oncologist is under contract, we file nothing, and we take no records. What's here today works right now — decode what your denial actually said, see whether it's the kind that gets overturned, and walk into your next appointment with the right questions.
Start here: decode your denial — is it worth fighting? Then practise the call to your insurer, and build the appeal packetWhat to gather Your pathology or biomarker report (e.g. PD-L1, stage)
Most commercial and ACA plans give you 180 days for an internal appeal; Medicare Advantage is often 60–65. Whatever your letter states always wins.
Decode your denial.
Denial letters are written to be confusing, and insurers count on you giving up. Tell us the kind of denial and when it arrived — we'll tell you how winnable it is, the strongest argument for your case, and your deadline clock. No upload, nothing stored.
OncoQue in 15 seconds
- Cancer's second diagnosis: the bill. Denials, copays and drug prices, not the disease itself.
- A denial is a first offer. Medicare Advantage: <12% appeal; 80.7% get overturned.
- Decode what the letter said. The type, the deadline, the call. Nothing leaves your browser.
- Signed appeals are planned. Not open yet. Today the tools run in your browser.
- OncoQue. Tools for a cancer denial. oncoque.com
A denial isn't the final word. It's a bet that you're too sick to fight back.
A denial is a first offer, not a verdict.
Insurers count on you not fighting — that's the whole model. Almost no one appeals, and most who do, win. A physician's signature puts a named clinician's argument in front of the payer.
The denial decoder.
Denial letters are written to be given up on. Pick the kind of denial and the date on the letter, and this tells you how winnable that kind usually is, the strongest argument for your case, and your deadline. Runs entirely in your browser — nothing is transmitted or stored.
The visit checklist.
A ten-minute checklist you fill in at home so the oncology visit isn't spent reconstructing context. What to bring, what to ask, what to request afterward — including a copy of your visit notes, which HIPAA gives you the right to ask for (45 CFR 164.524) and most people never do.
Practise the call.
Rehearse the phone call about a denial with an invented plan representative: say which denial, get a reference number, the criteria in writing, the deadline, a peer-to-peer, the independent review. A phrase-checker in your browser shows what you left out. Then tick off an appeal packet and print it with a call log.
Know what the letter actually said.
Most denials aren't clinical judgments — they're codes. A missing prior authorization, a site-of-care rule, an unmet step-therapy requirement. Each type has a different route back, and the letter rarely says which one you're in. Naming the type is the whole first move.
Know your deadline.
The single most expensive thing about a denial is the calendar. Internal appeal windows are short and they start running from the date on the letter, not the date you opened it. After the internal appeal, you generally have the right to an independent external review — a different set of eyes, not the insurer's.
Get help that exists right now.
You do not have to wait for us, and you should not. Hospital oncology social workers and financial navigators file appeals and find assistance as part of their job, at no cost to you. National case managers do the same by phone. This is the most underused resource in cancer care.
Attested, not autonomous.
Many denials are issued at scale by automated rules, and the letter rarely names who decided or why. Where software makes that call, it is the autonomous decision-making the AMA warns against: AI as a decision-maker instead of a tool a physician stands behind. The answer worth building toward is in the one language the system can't ignore: a licensed oncologist's signature, attesting medical necessity under their own license. That service is not open. A 2026 Nature Medicine paper argues the benchmarks these AI systems are judged on are misleading and insufficient — a high accuracy score is not the same as being safe in a real patient's case.
A "no" arrives with a code. The letter rarely names who decided or why — it works at scale and counts on you giving up.
A board-certified oncologist reads the record and signs the medical-necessity argument under their own license. A signed appeal puts a named clinician on the record. This is the model — not something OncoQue offers today.
US board-certified oncologists, under their own name, license, and malpractice policy. None are contracted yet — that bench is the thing being built.
Federal external-review rules bar paying a reviewer based on the outcome (45 CFR 147.136). Independence is the whole basis of legitimacy, which makes the bench slow and expensive to build honestly.
Never a replacement for your oncologist, and never legal advice. And until a physician signs something, it is a draft — not an attestation.
If they say no again.
Most people stop when the insurer denies the appeal. That is the wrong place to stop. Once your plan's own appeal is finished, a body that is not your insurer can be made to decide — and for most private plans that decision binds the insurer. Which process you get depends entirely on who pays for your coverage. Pick yours.
Tools for the cancer journey
questions to ask · symptom red-flags · appointment prep — no signup
Open
Walk in with the right questions.
The hardest part of an oncology appointment is knowing what to ask while your head is spinning. Tell us where you are, and we'll build a focused, printable list — the questions a good oncologist wants you to ask. Turn the overwhelm into a page you can hold.
Your questions
Is this an emergency?
Cancer treatment throws symptoms at you, and it's hard to know which can wait until morning and which can't. Tap anything you're noticing right now. We'll show you what oncology teams tell their own patients to do — sorted by how fast it matters.
Prepare once. Walk in ready.
The oncology appointment is 20 minutes. Most of that time disappears explaining context your doctor already has in the chart — or that you forgot to bring. This checklist takes 10 minutes at home and recovers that time in the room.
The tools work today. The appeal service is not open.
The denial decoder, the call practice, the red-flag check, and the appointment checklist work today. They run in your browser. No account, no email required, nothing sent to us.
No account · runs on your deviceAn appeal signed by a physician is the thing we're building, and it is not running. No oncologist is contracted, nothing is being filed, and no price has been set. When there's something real, it will be priced in the open.
Not accepting cases · not accepting recordsYour appeal rights don't depend on us. Your hospital's oncology social worker and financial navigator help file appeals at no cost to you, and national case managers do this work too — the links are in the tools below.
Help that exists today · not oursWhat an attested appeal would look like — and what's missing.
This is a design, not a description of a running service. Each step below names what is still required before it could honestly be offered to a patient.
Your records come together
Every visit, lab, scan, and path report in one timeline, so the argument cites your actual evidence.
needs: signed BAAThe appeal is drafted
The denial becomes a medical-necessity argument — coverage criteria, guideline citations, evidence from the record.
needs: buildAn oncologist reads it
A board-certified oncologist reads the draft, edits what needs editing, and attests under their own license.
needs: contracted benchThe signed appeal is filed
The physician signs, it gets filed on your behalf, and it's tracked to a decision.
needs: filing processYour cancer records and your money deserve real answers. Here are ours.
None yet — and we won't pretend otherwise. No oncologist is under contract to sign appeals. The attested model is what we're building toward, not a service running today.
We don't take them. No BAA is in place, so OncoQue does not receive or store medical records or denial letters. The tools below run in your browser and send us nothing.
Nothing is for sale here. No card, no account, no subscription, no fee — because there is no service yet to charge for.
OncoQue is about the bills, never the medicine. Your treating oncologist stays exactly where they are.
Start with the tools. Keep your denial letter.
Don't send us your records — we're not able to receive them. Decode the denial yourself in the tool above, then act on the deadline printed on your letter. If you want to know when the attested-appeal service actually opens, leave an email and nothing else.
Email me when appeals openWhat OncoQue is not. Not currently an appeals service — we do not file appeals, no physician is under contract to sign one, and we are not accepting medical records or denial letters. Not a replacement for the oncologist treating you. Not a law firm, and not legal advice. The tools here are educational aids, not medical or coverage advice, and no one can promise a payer says yes. If a site tells you otherwise about what it can do for a cancer patient, ask it to name the physicians.
Cancer first. Every serious diagnosis next.
One email if the attested-appeal service opens, and one if we ship a tool worth your time. Nothing else. We won't ask for your diagnosis, and we can't take your records.
No marketing. Updates only.