Process of Care Failures in Breast Cancer Diagnosis

Follow-up to Abnormal Cancer Screening Tests: Considering the Multilevel Context of Care

“…This approach would view the problem of follow-up to abnormal screening as a multilevel issue (14, 56) and consider bidirectional interactions. The challenge is to identify potentially modifiable factors among individuals, family members, providers and/or organizations that can be targeted in interventions that will improve the likelihood of follow-up for the patient (23, 36).…”

Mammography Result Notification Letters: Are They Easy to Read and Understand?

“…2 Delayed follow-up and lack of follow-up after an abnormal mammogram are common, especially in health systems serving low-income, ethnic minority women. [3][4][5][6][7][8] These women are at higher risk of experiencing delays in breast cancer diagnosis [8][9][10] and are more likely to present with advanced stage breast cancer 11 for reasons that may include differences in screening rates and tumor characteristics. 12,13 Many factors affect the likelihood that a woman will follow up after an abnormal mammogram, 3,14 including the successful communication of test results.…”

Working up rectal bleeding in adult primary care practices

“…Guideline concordance was based on the Harvard Risk Management Foundation's 2006 Colon Cancer Screening and Diagnosis Guidelines [8], an evidence-based algorithm widely distributed to study practices [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17]. The Guidelines for rectal bleeding called for a colonoscopy among patients ≥50 years old with rectal bleeding and no colonoscopy in the previous two years, and among patients 40-49 years old with a family history of colon cancer or colonic adenomas.…”