LB31
Age appropriate or site specific care for teenagers and young adults with cancer: which is more important? Results of a survey of medical professionals
Rebecca Birch1, Robert West1, Dan Stark2, David Forman1, Ian Lewis2, Richard Feltbower1
1University of Leeds, UK; 2Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, UK
Background
Unlike the care of older adults and younger children with cancer, there is
no consistent definition of specialist care for teenage and young adult (TYA)
patients. Indeed there remain ongoing discussions as to whether age appropriate
or site specific models of care should underpin TYA services. We aimed to
examine the aspects of care deemed most important by a sample of medical
professionals involved in the treatment of TYA patients.
Method
Medical professionals from NHS Trusts across the UK involved in the
treatment of TYA patients were identified using NHS websites. An online survey
was distributed via email to over 350 people. Analysis of the responses was
performed using Latent Gold 4.0, a statistical package designed for latent
class modelling, a method used to establish underlying characteristics and
relationships used to group the data into natural/latent classes.
Results
Of the 350 people who received the survey, 173 responded (49%) and 140/173
responses (81%) were completed sufficiently for inclusion in the analysis. The
majority of respondents had less than 10% of their caseload accounted for by
TYA. The most frequently suggested age range for TYA was 13 to 25. Latent class
analysis identified three clusters of respondents, one rating site specific
treatment most highly; one rating age specific treatment highly and the third
cluster who rated all aspects of care (both age and site specific) very highly.
Conclusion
Our data indicate three clear groups of respondents who rated certain
aspects of care differently, based on a preference either for age and site
specific care, or a combination of the two. This finding highlights the
difficulty in agreeing a definition of specialist care for this age group.
Future work will identify the specialities of responders aligned with each
cluster.
