Earlier cancer diagnosis in primary care: a feasibility economic analysis of ThinkCancer!

Background UK cancer survival rates are much lower compared with other high-income countries. In primary care, there are opportunities for general practitioners (GPs) and other healthcare professionals to act more quickly in response to presented symptoms that might represent cancer. ThinkCancer! is a complex behaviour change intervention aimed at primary care practice teams to improve the timely diagnosis of cancer.

Aim To explore the costs of delivering the ThinkCancer! intervention to expedite cancer diagnosis in primary care.

Design Feasibility economic analysis using a micro-costing approach.

Setting Nineteen general practices in Wales, UK.

Methods From an NHS perspective, we used micro-costing methodology to determine whether it was feasible to gather sufficient economic data to cost the ThinkCancer! intervention. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, ThinkCancer! was mainly delivered remotely online in a digital format. Budget impact analysis and sensitivity analysis were conducted to explore the costs of face-to-face delivery of the ThinkCancer! intervention as intended pre-COVID-19.

Results The total costs of delivering the ThinkCancer! intervention across 19 general practices in Wales was £25,030, with an average cost per practice of £1,317 (SD: 578.2). Findings from the budget impact analysis indicated a total cost of £34,630 for face-to-face delivery.

Conclusion Data collection methods were successful in gathering sufficient health economics data to cost the ThinkCancer! intervention. Results of this feasibility study will be used to inform a future definitive economic evaluation alongside a pragmatic randomised controlled trial.

Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04823559.