User login
Women who were Black, Latina, American Indian, or Alaska Native were significantly less likely than White women to receive guidelines-adherent treatment for endometrial cancer, based on data from more than 80,000 women.
The incidence of uterine cancer has increased across all ethnicities in recent decades, and adherence to the National Comprehensive Cancer Network treatment guidelines has been associated with improved survival, wrote Victoria A. Rodriguez, MSW, MPH, of the University of California, Irvine, and colleagues. “To date, however, there are few studies that have looked at endometrial cancer disparities with adherence to National Comprehensive Cancer Network treatment guidelines.”
In a retrospective study published in Obstetrics & Gynecology, the researchers used data from the SEER (Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results) database between Jan. 1, 2006, and Dec. 31, 2015. The study population included 83,883 women aged 18 years and older who were diagnosed with their first or only endometrial carcinoma. The primary dependent variable was adherence to the NCCN guidelines for the initial course of treatment, which included a combination of therapies based on cancer subtype and the extent of the disease, the researchers said.
The researchers combined the guidelines and the corresponding data from the SEER database to create “a binary variable representing adherence to [NCCN] guidelines (1 = adherent treatment, 0 = nonadherent treatment).”
Approximately 60% of the total patient population received guidelines-adherent treatment. In a multivariate analysis, Black women, Latina women, and American Indian or Alaska Native women were significantly less likely than White women to receive such treatment (odds ratios, 0.88, 0.92, and 0.82, respectively), controlling for factors including neighborhood socioeconomic status, age, and stage at diagnosis, year of diagnosis, histology, and disease grade. Asian women and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander women were significantly more likely to received guidelines-adherent treatment, compared with White women (OR, 1.14 and 1.19, respectively).
The researchers also found a significant gradient in guidelines-adherent treatment based on neighborhood socioeconomic status. Relative to the highest neighborhood socioeconomic status group, women in the lower groups had significantly lower odds of receiving guidelines-adherent treatment, with ORs of 0.89, 0.84, 0.80, and 0.73, respectively, for the high-middle neighborhood socioeconomic group, the middle group, the low-middle group, and the lowest group (P < .001 for all).
“Our study is novel in that it examines neighborhood socioeconomic disparities in the understudied context of treatment adherence for endometrial cancer,” the researchers noted.
The study findings were limited by several factors in including the retrospective design and potential for unmeasured confounding variables not included in SEER, such as hospital and physician characteristics, the researchers said. Also, the SEER data set was limited to only the first course of treatment, and did not include information on patient comorbidities that might affect treatment.
“Future research should qualitatively explore reasons for nonadherent treatment within endometrial cancer and other cancer sites among various racial-ethnic groups and socioeconomic status groups, with special attention to low-income women of color,” the researchers emphasized. More research on the impact of comorbidities on a patient’s ability to receive guidelines-based care should be used to inform whether comorbidities should be part of the NCCN guidelines.
However, the results were strengthened by the large sample size and diverse population, so the findings are generalizable to the overall U.S. population, the researchers said.
“Interventions are needed to ensure that equitable cancer treatment practices are available for all individuals regardless of their racial-ethnic or socioeconomic backgrounds,” they concluded.
Pursue optimal treatment to curb mortality
Even more concerning than the increase in the incidence of endometrial cancer in the United States is the increase in mortality from this disease, said Emma C. Rossi, MD, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, in an interview.
“Therefore, it is critical that we identify factors which might be contributing to the increasing lethality of this cancer,” she emphasized. “One such potential factor is race, as it has been observed that Black race is associated with an increased risk of death from endometrial cancer. Historically, this was attributed to the more aggressive subtypes of endometrial cancer (such as serous) which have a higher incidence among Black women. However, more recently, population-based studies have identified that this worse prognosis is independent of histologic cell type,” which suggests that something in our health care delivery is contributing to these worse outcomes.
“The present study helps to confirm these concerning associations, shedding some light on contributory factors, in this case, modifiable (adherence to recommended guidelines) and less modifiable (neighborhood socioeconomic environments) [ones],” Dr. Rossi noted. “The guidelines that are established by the NCCN are chosen after they have been shown to be associated with improved outcomes (including either survival or quality of life), and therefore lack of adherence to these outcomes may suggest inferior quality care is being delivered.”
Studies such as this are helpful in exposing the problem of treatment disparity to help identify sources of problems to develop solutions, she added.
The results should inspire clinicians “to feel agency in changing these outcomes, albeit by tackling very difficult social, political, and health system shortfalls,” she said.
Identify barriers to care
Barriers to greater adherence to guidelines-based care include varying definitions of such care, Dr. Rossi said.
“This is particularly true for surgical management of endometrial cancer, which remains controversial with respect to lymph node assessment. Lack of surgical staging with lymph node assessment was considered noncompliant care for this study; however, lymphadenectomy has not specifically, in and of itself, been associated with improved outcomes, and therefore some surgeons argue against performing it routinely,” she explained.
“Lack of access to sophisticated surgical tools and advanced surgical techniques may account for nonguidelines-based care in the patients with early-stage endometrial cancer; however, there are likely other differences in the ability to deliver guideline-concordant care (such as chemotherapy and radiation therapy) for advanced-stage cancers,” Dr. Rossi said. “Patient and provider positive attitudes toward adjuvant therapy, access to transportation, supportive home environments, paid sick leave, well-controlled or minimal comorbidities are all factors which promote the administration of complex adjuvant therapies such as chemotherapy and radiation. In low-resource neighborhoods and minority communities, barriers to these factors may be contributing to nonguidelines-concordant care.”
Dr. Rossi emphasized the need to “dive deeper into these data at individual health-system and provider levels.” For example, research is needed to compare the practice patterns and models of high-performing clinical practices with lower-performing practices in terms of factors such as tumor boards, journal review, peer review, dashboards, and metrics. By doing so, “we can ensure that we are understanding where and why variations in care are occurring,” Dr. Rossi said.
The study was supported in part by the Faculty Mentor Program Fellowship from the University of California, Irvine, graduate division. Ms. Rodriguez was supported in part by a grant from the National Cancer Institute. The researchers had no financial conflicts to disclose. Dr. Rossi had no financial conflicts to disclose.
Women who were Black, Latina, American Indian, or Alaska Native were significantly less likely than White women to receive guidelines-adherent treatment for endometrial cancer, based on data from more than 80,000 women.
The incidence of uterine cancer has increased across all ethnicities in recent decades, and adherence to the National Comprehensive Cancer Network treatment guidelines has been associated with improved survival, wrote Victoria A. Rodriguez, MSW, MPH, of the University of California, Irvine, and colleagues. “To date, however, there are few studies that have looked at endometrial cancer disparities with adherence to National Comprehensive Cancer Network treatment guidelines.”
In a retrospective study published in Obstetrics & Gynecology, the researchers used data from the SEER (Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results) database between Jan. 1, 2006, and Dec. 31, 2015. The study population included 83,883 women aged 18 years and older who were diagnosed with their first or only endometrial carcinoma. The primary dependent variable was adherence to the NCCN guidelines for the initial course of treatment, which included a combination of therapies based on cancer subtype and the extent of the disease, the researchers said.
The researchers combined the guidelines and the corresponding data from the SEER database to create “a binary variable representing adherence to [NCCN] guidelines (1 = adherent treatment, 0 = nonadherent treatment).”
Approximately 60% of the total patient population received guidelines-adherent treatment. In a multivariate analysis, Black women, Latina women, and American Indian or Alaska Native women were significantly less likely than White women to receive such treatment (odds ratios, 0.88, 0.92, and 0.82, respectively), controlling for factors including neighborhood socioeconomic status, age, and stage at diagnosis, year of diagnosis, histology, and disease grade. Asian women and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander women were significantly more likely to received guidelines-adherent treatment, compared with White women (OR, 1.14 and 1.19, respectively).
The researchers also found a significant gradient in guidelines-adherent treatment based on neighborhood socioeconomic status. Relative to the highest neighborhood socioeconomic status group, women in the lower groups had significantly lower odds of receiving guidelines-adherent treatment, with ORs of 0.89, 0.84, 0.80, and 0.73, respectively, for the high-middle neighborhood socioeconomic group, the middle group, the low-middle group, and the lowest group (P < .001 for all).
“Our study is novel in that it examines neighborhood socioeconomic disparities in the understudied context of treatment adherence for endometrial cancer,” the researchers noted.
The study findings were limited by several factors in including the retrospective design and potential for unmeasured confounding variables not included in SEER, such as hospital and physician characteristics, the researchers said. Also, the SEER data set was limited to only the first course of treatment, and did not include information on patient comorbidities that might affect treatment.
“Future research should qualitatively explore reasons for nonadherent treatment within endometrial cancer and other cancer sites among various racial-ethnic groups and socioeconomic status groups, with special attention to low-income women of color,” the researchers emphasized. More research on the impact of comorbidities on a patient’s ability to receive guidelines-based care should be used to inform whether comorbidities should be part of the NCCN guidelines.
However, the results were strengthened by the large sample size and diverse population, so the findings are generalizable to the overall U.S. population, the researchers said.
“Interventions are needed to ensure that equitable cancer treatment practices are available for all individuals regardless of their racial-ethnic or socioeconomic backgrounds,” they concluded.
Pursue optimal treatment to curb mortality
Even more concerning than the increase in the incidence of endometrial cancer in the United States is the increase in mortality from this disease, said Emma C. Rossi, MD, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, in an interview.
“Therefore, it is critical that we identify factors which might be contributing to the increasing lethality of this cancer,” she emphasized. “One such potential factor is race, as it has been observed that Black race is associated with an increased risk of death from endometrial cancer. Historically, this was attributed to the more aggressive subtypes of endometrial cancer (such as serous) which have a higher incidence among Black women. However, more recently, population-based studies have identified that this worse prognosis is independent of histologic cell type,” which suggests that something in our health care delivery is contributing to these worse outcomes.
“The present study helps to confirm these concerning associations, shedding some light on contributory factors, in this case, modifiable (adherence to recommended guidelines) and less modifiable (neighborhood socioeconomic environments) [ones],” Dr. Rossi noted. “The guidelines that are established by the NCCN are chosen after they have been shown to be associated with improved outcomes (including either survival or quality of life), and therefore lack of adherence to these outcomes may suggest inferior quality care is being delivered.”
Studies such as this are helpful in exposing the problem of treatment disparity to help identify sources of problems to develop solutions, she added.
The results should inspire clinicians “to feel agency in changing these outcomes, albeit by tackling very difficult social, political, and health system shortfalls,” she said.
Identify barriers to care
Barriers to greater adherence to guidelines-based care include varying definitions of such care, Dr. Rossi said.
“This is particularly true for surgical management of endometrial cancer, which remains controversial with respect to lymph node assessment. Lack of surgical staging with lymph node assessment was considered noncompliant care for this study; however, lymphadenectomy has not specifically, in and of itself, been associated with improved outcomes, and therefore some surgeons argue against performing it routinely,” she explained.
“Lack of access to sophisticated surgical tools and advanced surgical techniques may account for nonguidelines-based care in the patients with early-stage endometrial cancer; however, there are likely other differences in the ability to deliver guideline-concordant care (such as chemotherapy and radiation therapy) for advanced-stage cancers,” Dr. Rossi said. “Patient and provider positive attitudes toward adjuvant therapy, access to transportation, supportive home environments, paid sick leave, well-controlled or minimal comorbidities are all factors which promote the administration of complex adjuvant therapies such as chemotherapy and radiation. In low-resource neighborhoods and minority communities, barriers to these factors may be contributing to nonguidelines-concordant care.”
Dr. Rossi emphasized the need to “dive deeper into these data at individual health-system and provider levels.” For example, research is needed to compare the practice patterns and models of high-performing clinical practices with lower-performing practices in terms of factors such as tumor boards, journal review, peer review, dashboards, and metrics. By doing so, “we can ensure that we are understanding where and why variations in care are occurring,” Dr. Rossi said.
The study was supported in part by the Faculty Mentor Program Fellowship from the University of California, Irvine, graduate division. Ms. Rodriguez was supported in part by a grant from the National Cancer Institute. The researchers had no financial conflicts to disclose. Dr. Rossi had no financial conflicts to disclose.
Women who were Black, Latina, American Indian, or Alaska Native were significantly less likely than White women to receive guidelines-adherent treatment for endometrial cancer, based on data from more than 80,000 women.
The incidence of uterine cancer has increased across all ethnicities in recent decades, and adherence to the National Comprehensive Cancer Network treatment guidelines has been associated with improved survival, wrote Victoria A. Rodriguez, MSW, MPH, of the University of California, Irvine, and colleagues. “To date, however, there are few studies that have looked at endometrial cancer disparities with adherence to National Comprehensive Cancer Network treatment guidelines.”
In a retrospective study published in Obstetrics & Gynecology, the researchers used data from the SEER (Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results) database between Jan. 1, 2006, and Dec. 31, 2015. The study population included 83,883 women aged 18 years and older who were diagnosed with their first or only endometrial carcinoma. The primary dependent variable was adherence to the NCCN guidelines for the initial course of treatment, which included a combination of therapies based on cancer subtype and the extent of the disease, the researchers said.
The researchers combined the guidelines and the corresponding data from the SEER database to create “a binary variable representing adherence to [NCCN] guidelines (1 = adherent treatment, 0 = nonadherent treatment).”
Approximately 60% of the total patient population received guidelines-adherent treatment. In a multivariate analysis, Black women, Latina women, and American Indian or Alaska Native women were significantly less likely than White women to receive such treatment (odds ratios, 0.88, 0.92, and 0.82, respectively), controlling for factors including neighborhood socioeconomic status, age, and stage at diagnosis, year of diagnosis, histology, and disease grade. Asian women and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander women were significantly more likely to received guidelines-adherent treatment, compared with White women (OR, 1.14 and 1.19, respectively).
The researchers also found a significant gradient in guidelines-adherent treatment based on neighborhood socioeconomic status. Relative to the highest neighborhood socioeconomic status group, women in the lower groups had significantly lower odds of receiving guidelines-adherent treatment, with ORs of 0.89, 0.84, 0.80, and 0.73, respectively, for the high-middle neighborhood socioeconomic group, the middle group, the low-middle group, and the lowest group (P < .001 for all).
“Our study is novel in that it examines neighborhood socioeconomic disparities in the understudied context of treatment adherence for endometrial cancer,” the researchers noted.
The study findings were limited by several factors in including the retrospective design and potential for unmeasured confounding variables not included in SEER, such as hospital and physician characteristics, the researchers said. Also, the SEER data set was limited to only the first course of treatment, and did not include information on patient comorbidities that might affect treatment.
“Future research should qualitatively explore reasons for nonadherent treatment within endometrial cancer and other cancer sites among various racial-ethnic groups and socioeconomic status groups, with special attention to low-income women of color,” the researchers emphasized. More research on the impact of comorbidities on a patient’s ability to receive guidelines-based care should be used to inform whether comorbidities should be part of the NCCN guidelines.
However, the results were strengthened by the large sample size and diverse population, so the findings are generalizable to the overall U.S. population, the researchers said.
“Interventions are needed to ensure that equitable cancer treatment practices are available for all individuals regardless of their racial-ethnic or socioeconomic backgrounds,” they concluded.
Pursue optimal treatment to curb mortality
Even more concerning than the increase in the incidence of endometrial cancer in the United States is the increase in mortality from this disease, said Emma C. Rossi, MD, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, in an interview.
“Therefore, it is critical that we identify factors which might be contributing to the increasing lethality of this cancer,” she emphasized. “One such potential factor is race, as it has been observed that Black race is associated with an increased risk of death from endometrial cancer. Historically, this was attributed to the more aggressive subtypes of endometrial cancer (such as serous) which have a higher incidence among Black women. However, more recently, population-based studies have identified that this worse prognosis is independent of histologic cell type,” which suggests that something in our health care delivery is contributing to these worse outcomes.
“The present study helps to confirm these concerning associations, shedding some light on contributory factors, in this case, modifiable (adherence to recommended guidelines) and less modifiable (neighborhood socioeconomic environments) [ones],” Dr. Rossi noted. “The guidelines that are established by the NCCN are chosen after they have been shown to be associated with improved outcomes (including either survival or quality of life), and therefore lack of adherence to these outcomes may suggest inferior quality care is being delivered.”
Studies such as this are helpful in exposing the problem of treatment disparity to help identify sources of problems to develop solutions, she added.
The results should inspire clinicians “to feel agency in changing these outcomes, albeit by tackling very difficult social, political, and health system shortfalls,” she said.
Identify barriers to care
Barriers to greater adherence to guidelines-based care include varying definitions of such care, Dr. Rossi said.
“This is particularly true for surgical management of endometrial cancer, which remains controversial with respect to lymph node assessment. Lack of surgical staging with lymph node assessment was considered noncompliant care for this study; however, lymphadenectomy has not specifically, in and of itself, been associated with improved outcomes, and therefore some surgeons argue against performing it routinely,” she explained.
“Lack of access to sophisticated surgical tools and advanced surgical techniques may account for nonguidelines-based care in the patients with early-stage endometrial cancer; however, there are likely other differences in the ability to deliver guideline-concordant care (such as chemotherapy and radiation therapy) for advanced-stage cancers,” Dr. Rossi said. “Patient and provider positive attitudes toward adjuvant therapy, access to transportation, supportive home environments, paid sick leave, well-controlled or minimal comorbidities are all factors which promote the administration of complex adjuvant therapies such as chemotherapy and radiation. In low-resource neighborhoods and minority communities, barriers to these factors may be contributing to nonguidelines-concordant care.”
Dr. Rossi emphasized the need to “dive deeper into these data at individual health-system and provider levels.” For example, research is needed to compare the practice patterns and models of high-performing clinical practices with lower-performing practices in terms of factors such as tumor boards, journal review, peer review, dashboards, and metrics. By doing so, “we can ensure that we are understanding where and why variations in care are occurring,” Dr. Rossi said.
The study was supported in part by the Faculty Mentor Program Fellowship from the University of California, Irvine, graduate division. Ms. Rodriguez was supported in part by a grant from the National Cancer Institute. The researchers had no financial conflicts to disclose. Dr. Rossi had no financial conflicts to disclose.
FROM OBSTETRICS & GYNECOLOGY