Increasing Primary Care Physician Colorectal Cancer Screening Rates

University of Pennsylvania

Status: Completed

Conditions: Colorectal Cancer Screening

Treatments: Behavioral: eToolbox; Behavioral: no link to eToolbox

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; Other U.S. Federal agency; NIH

Identifiers

NCT00955344

K22CA133186-01

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of the study is to determine if a Web-based intervention increases physician rates of colorectal cancer recommendation rates in a group of physicians participating in the American Board of Internal Medicine's Maintenance of Certification Program. This study will also compare the content of practice improvement plans submitted by the diplomats in each study arm to determine the components of the plans that are associated with colorectal cancer rates.

Full description

Colorectal cancer is the 2nd leading cause of cancer deaths in the U.S. Although colorectal cancer screening (CRCS) is effective, cost-effective and consistently recommended by clinical practice guidelines, only 57.3% of the adults over 50 years have been screened within the recommended interval. Preliminary research conducted by this PI demonstrates that approximately 90% of patients who have not had CRCS report that a doctors recommendation would motivate them to undergo screening. However, research also shows that physicians do not consistently recommend CRCS to each eligible patient. In this study the barriers of and facilitators to physician recommendation of CRCS are tested in the to proposed randomized controlled trial. The trial will pilot test an interactive, multifaceted, Web-based intervention (eToolbox) to increase primary care physician rates of CRCS. This application innovatively proposes to pilot test the eToolbox in the setting of the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) Maintenance of Certification process within the Preventive Services Practice Improvement Module, a physician-directed measurement of their performance and quality improvement requirement for board re-certification.

Enrollment: 134 patients

Sex: All

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• ABIM certification and have or plan to enroll in the Maintenance of Certification program
• Primary Care Physicians

Exclusion criteria

• Diplomats are not able to participate in this study if they are retired physicians, do not practice a primary care practice or who have already taken part in the study

Trial design

Primary purpose: Prevention

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

---

134 participants in 2 patient groups

Web-based intervention (eToolbox)

Experimental group

Description:

This arm will allow diplomats of the American Board of Internal Medicine to complete the Practice Improvement Module that will embed a link to the web-based intervention (eToolbox).

Treatment:

Behavioral: eToolbox

Practice Improvement Module

Active Comparator group

Description:

This arm will allow diplomats of the American Board of Internal Medicine to complete the Practice Improvement Module without any link to the Web-based eToolbox.

Treatment:

Behavioral: no link to eToolbox