Variations in recommended surveillance in colorectal cancer survivorship care plans.

Abstract

13 Background: Survivorship care plans (SCPs) outline pertinent information about a cancer survivor’s treatment and follow-up care. We describe the content of colorectal cancer (CRC) SCPs, completed as part of a randomized controlled trial of SCPs, and evaluate whether follow-up recommendations are guideline concordant. Methods: We analyzed 74 CRC SCPs from an academic and community cancer center. Frequency distributions and descriptive statistics were calculated for the entire cohort and separately by recruiting site. Follow-up recommendations were compared to American Cancer Society (ACS), American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) and National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) guidelines (Table). Results: Content routinely provided in SCPs (>80%) included patient demographics, cancer diagnosis, treatment details (surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy) as well as treatment-related side effects. SCP content specified less frequently included cancer stage, cancer risk (predisposing conditions), and recommendations for genetic counseling/testing and health promotion. Nearly all SCPs from the community site provided uniform, guideline-concordant follow-up. At the academic site, on average, more than 15 follow-up recommendations were listed for each surveillance modality, except colonoscopy. Among the SCPs that specified the frequency of follow-up care, the rate of guideline-concordant recommendations was 15/42 (36%) for follow-up visits, 29/43 (67%) for imaging, 12/45 (27%) for laboratory and 39/39 (100%) for colonoscopy. Conclusions: SCPs consistently provided information about CRC diagnosis and treatment, but often omitted information about cancer risk, staging and prognosis. There was considerable variation between cancer centers in the follow-up recommendations suggested for CRC survivors. Future work to improve the consistency of SCP follow-up recommendations with guidelines may be needed. Clinical trial information: NCT03035773 . [Table: see text]