Health Care Barriers Contribute to Delays in Follow-Up Screening for Women With Cancer

the Oncology Nurse Advisor take:

Researchers performed secondary analyses of data from the intervention arms of the Patient Navigation Research Program to gain a better understanding of the association between barriers to care and clinical outcomes within patient navigation programs.

The data included navigated participants with abnormal breast and cervical cancer screening test results from 2007 to 2010.

The researchers considered the number of unique barriers (0, 1, 2, ≥3) documented during patient navigation encounters and the presence of socio-legal barriers originating from social policy (yes/no).

Approximately 75% of 2,600 breast screening participants and more than one-half of 1,387 cervical screening participants had barriers to care documented.

Any number of barriers was associated with less timely resolution among breast cancer participants compared with those who had no barriers documented; however, only the presence of two or more barriers was associated with less timely resolution among cervical screening participants.

The study findings demonstrated that barriers to care resulted in less timely resolution of abnormal screening results among navigated women.

The researchers conclude further innovations are needed to improve the impact of patient navigation programs nationwide.