Rogers, T.K., Boon, M., Bowen, D. et al. (3 more authors) (2019) Telephone follow-up to identify incident lung cancer symptoms in COPD patients. British Journal of Cancer Research, 2 (4). pp. 308-313. ISSN 2631-5297
Abstract
Background: COPD patients are at very high risk of lung cancer, yet new respiratory symptoms of lung cancer may be particularly hard to identify. Aim: We sought to assess the feasibility of actively seeking lung cancer symptoms to improve the timeliness of diagnosis in this group. Design and setting: Observational study to evaluate the feasibility and practicability of the intervention. Patients were recruited from a primary care COPD register and were contacted by telephone 4-monthly over 12 months. Chest X-ray rates were assessed over the 20 months before, during the intervention and for 20 months following it, in both the study group and in patients on the register who did not volunteer for the intervention. Results: Most symptoms were identified at the first call, with 13 (17%) subjects admitting to a new persistent cough and 7 (9%) to a change in their cough. As a result of symptoms identified on the first call, 21 (27%) of the participating patients were referred for a chest X-ray and 4 (5%) were referred urgently to secondary care. Incident symptoms continued frequently to be identified at all subsequent calls, with an overall total of 49% of patients qualifying for and receiving a chest X-ray. Interestingly, the chest X-ray rate remained significantly elevated for the 20 months following the intervention, whilst there appeared to be little change in the non-study COPD patients. Conclusion: The intervention was readily practicable and lung cancer symptoms were frequently identified. The intervention may have resulted in a behavior change leading to a persistently higher chest X-ray rate, although the comparator group was not a formal control group and further assessment in a randomized control trial appears justified.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © Rogers TK, et al. 2019. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
Keywords: | lung neoplasms; pulmonary disease; chronic obstructive; early diagnosis; primary health care; signs and symptoms; respiratory |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health (Sheffield) > School of Health and Related Research (Sheffield) > ScHARR - Sheffield Centre for Health and Related Research |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 09 Jun 2020 11:19 |
Last Modified: | 09 Jun 2020 11:19 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Mak Periodical Library |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.31488/bjcr.136 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:161560 |