Abstract
Background Shared decision making (SDM) is considered important to realise personalised cancer care. Increased general practitioner (GP) involvement after a diagnosis is advocated to improve SDM. Aim To explore if cancer patients are in need of GP involvement in cancer care in general and in SDM, and whether GP involvement occurred. Design and Setting An online national survey distributed by the Dutch Federation of Cancer Patient Organisation (NFK) in May 2019. Methods The survey was sent to (former) cancer patients. Topics included GP involvement in cancer care in general and in SDM. Descriptive statistics and quotes were used. Results Among 4,763 (former) cancer patients, 59% (N=2,804) expressed a need for GP involvement in cancer care. Of these patients, 79% (N=2,193) experienced GP involvement. Regarding GP involvement in SDM, 82% of the patients (N=3,724) expressed that the GP should “listen to patient’s worries and considerations”, 69% (N=3,130) to “check patient’s understanding of information”, 66% (N=3,006) to “discuss patient’s priorities in life and the consequences of treatment options for these priorities”, and 67% (N=3,045) to “create awareness of the patient’s role in the decision making”. This happened in 47%, 17%, 15% and 10% of these patients, respectively. Conclusion The majority of (former) cancer patients expressed a need for active GP involvement in cancer care. GP support in the fundamental SDM steps is presently insufficient. Therefore, GPs should be made aware of these needs and enabled to support their cancer patients in SDM. Keywords Neoplasms; general practice; decision making, shared.
- Received April 24, 2020.
- Accepted June 16, 2020.
- Copyright © 2020, The Authors
This article is Open Access: CC BY license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)