Patient and provider perspectives on delivery of oral cancer therapies.
Caitlin C Murphy, Simon J Craddock Lee, David E Gerber and 3 others
PMID 31239181WHAT IT FOUND
Patients taking oral anticancer drugs at home felt highly motivated, but few providers asked whether they had taken them.
Safety-net patients had lower costs; private insurance or Medicare patients faced co-payments. Providers described uneven education and communication.
Key findings
01Most patients reported feeling motivated to take oral therapies meticulously, yet few providers reported asking patients whether they had taken the medication.
02Safety-net patients encountered fewer barriers accessing oral therapies and often had lower out-of-pocket costs than referral-center patients with private insurance or Medicare.
03Safety-net patients often described waiting until the next appointment to report severe side effects if they could not reach someone by telephone, while referral-center patients also used an online portal.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
Only 22 patients and 10 providers were interviewed, so the findings describe these participants' views rather than a pattern across all patients or providers. Only 2 nurses and 1 pharmacist were interviewed, so the provider findings are mostly oncologist perspectives. Patients were recruited from a university referral center and a county safety-net hospital in Dallas, and eligibility was limited to English or Spanish speakers, so the findings may not apply elsewhere or to other languages. Caregivers joined 7 patient interviews, but their perspectives were not analysed, so the study does not report what caregivers experienced. The study did not measure adherence, costs, toxicities or clinical outcomes, and it did not test education, documentation or communication interventions.
Declared interests
The authors declared no competing interests. The supplied article types indicate NIH and U.S. Government P.H.S. research support.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that nurse-led telephone follow-up improves adherence or toxicity reporting. This study only interviewed patients and providers; it did not test any intervention, and only 2 nurses participated.