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Delay in time from diagnosis to treatment in metastatic melanoma, lung, and colon cancer
Abstract   Open access   Peer reviewed

Delay in time from diagnosis to treatment in metastatic melanoma, lung, and colon cancer

Muhammad Salman Faisal, Ahmed Khattab, Vida Jahangiri, Hira Shaikh, Soorih Shaikh, Abhishek Chaturvedi, Moses S. Raj and Gene Grant Finley
Journal of clinical oncology, Vol.37(15_suppl), pp.e23186-e23186
05/20/2019
DOI: 10.1200/JCO.2019.37.15_suppl.e23186
url
https://doi.org/10.1200/JCO.2019.37.15_suppl.e23186View
Published (Version of record) Open Access

Abstract

Abstract only e23186 Background: Delay in cancer treatment is anxiety provoking both for the patient and clinician. We conducted the study to evaluate the patterns of delay in treatment of patients with metastatic colon cancer, lung cancer and melanoma from diagnosis to the initiation of the treatment, and to identify the causes of delay. Methods: In this retrospective study, patients with metastatic colon cancer, lung cancer and melanoma diagnosed between 01/01/2016 to 12/31/2016 in a tertiary care network in the United States were studied. Data was collected from electronic health record (EHR) database, ‘Epic’. Variables such as demographic data, including patient age and gender, and type of cancer, and treatment received were analyzed. The causes of the delay were also evaluated when available. Results: Total number of patients in the study was 288. Mean age was 68.3 years (median 69 years) and 36% were alive at the time of data analysis. Male to female ratio was 1.4:1. 66.7% people had lung cancer, 30% had colon cancer and 3% had melanoma. 67 (23.6%) of total analyzed patients had denied definitive treatment and chose to undergo palliative management. Of the rest, most started treatment with chemotherapy (39.5%), followed by surgery (22.6%) and then radiation (14.6%). With the time of pathological diagnosis of the tumor taken as the date of diagnosis, mean delay from the day of diagnosis to the start of treatment in this study population observed was 27.7 days. 67 patients (23.3%) had a delay of more than 30 days, with the most common reason being systemic factors in 39 patients (58.2%), followed by patient factors in 23 patients (34.3%) and physician factors in 5 patients (7.5%). On logistic regression analysis, time from diagnosis to treatment didn’t predict mortality (OR = 0.99, 95% CI P = 0.10(0.97-1.002). Conclusions: Delay in treatment is common and the system factors one of the common reasons as exhibited by our study. Time from diagnosis to treatment didn’t predict mortality.

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