Multilevel Follow-up of Cancer Screening (mFOCUS): Protocol for a Multilevel Intervention to Improve the Follow-up of Abnormal Cancer Screening Test Results

Abstract

Introduction While substantial attention is focused on the delivery of routine preventive cancer screening, less attention has been paid to systematically ensuring that there is timely follow-up of abnormal screening test results. Barriers to completion of timely follow-up occur at the patient, provider, care team and system levels. Methods In this pragmatic cluster randomized controlled trial, primary care sites in three networks are randomized to one of four arms: (1) standard care, (2) "visit-based" reminders that appear in a patient's electronic health record (EHR) when it is accessed by either patient or providers (3) visit based reminders with population health outreach, and (4) visit based reminders, population health outreach, and patient navigation with systematic screening and referral to address social barriers to care. Eligible patients in participating practices are those overdue for follow-up of an abnormal results on breast, cervical, colorectal and lung cancer screening tests. Results The primary outcome is whether an individual receives follow-up, specific to the organ type and screening abnormality, within 120 days of becoming eligible for the trial. Secondary outcomes assess the effect of intervention components on the patient and provider experience of obtaining follow-up care and the delivery of the intervention components. Conclusions This trial will provide evidence for the role of a multilevel intervention on improving the follow-up of abnormal cancer screening test results. We will also specifically assess the relative impact of the components of the intervention, compared to standard care. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03979495.

Contribution highlights

• Introduction While substantial attention is focused on the delivery of routine preventive cancer screening, less attention has been paid to systematically ensuring that there is timely follow-up of abnormal screening test results.
• Barriers to completion of timely follow-up occur at the patient, provider, care team and system levels.

Extracted from the public abstract; no claims have been added.

Code and data

Publication metadata

DOI

10.1016/j.cct.2021.106533

PMID

34375748

PMCID

PMC8900526

Volume

109

Pages / article

106533

Version relationship

No separate preprint-to-publication relationship is currently recorded.

BibTeX

@article{Haas2021Multilevelfollow,
  title = {Multilevel Follow-up of Cancer Screening (mFOCUS): Protocol for a Multilevel Intervention to Improve the Follow-up of Abnormal Cancer Screening Test Results},
  author = {Jennifer S Haas and Steven J Atlas and Adam Wright and E John Orav and David G Aman and Erica S Breslau and Timothy E Burdick and Emily Carpenter and Frank Chang and Tin Dang and Jie Yang and Li Zhou and Anna Tosteson},
  journal = {Contemporary Clinical Trials},
  year = {2021},
  url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S155171442100269X},
  doi = {10.1016/j.cct.2021.106533},
  pmid = {34375748},
  volume = {109},
  pages = {106533}
}