Use of a best-practice advisory to increase survivorship clinic referrals

• Published in: Journal of clinical oncology Vol. 35; no. 5_suppl; p. 53
• Main Authors: Kircher, Sheetal Mehta, Slocum, Megan, Garcia, Sofia F., Veneruso, Aubri, Patel, Alpa, Kinahan, Karen, Gradishar, William John, Jain, Sarika, Flaum, Lisa E., Santa-Maria, Cesar, Penedo, Frank J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 10.02.2017
• ISSN: 0732-183X; 1527-7755
• DOI: 10.1200/JCO.2017.35.5_suppl.53

Abstract only 53 Background: The American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer require accredited institutions to give patients a survivorship care plan (SCPs) within six months of completing curative intent therapy. However, only a minority are receiving SCP’s. Some institutions have survivorship clinics to deliver comprehensive care, including SCP’s. Insufficient referrals to such clinics are a common barrier due to survivorship not being integrated into oncology workflows. To address this, we developed and implemented a best practice advisory (BPA) alert within our EMR to identify eligible patients and facilitate referrals to the survivorship clinic. Methods: Our pilot included breast cancer patients within medical oncology. The BPA electronic alert criteria included: stage 0-III, new patient encounter within 12 months, no SCP completed or previous referral. Upon triggering, the BPA asks “Does your patient require a SCP?” followed by 3 options: 1) SCP needed- an automatic order is generated, if signed, the BPA will not fire again, if unsigned, it will fire at the next encounter (no sooner than 30 days) and will continue until an order is placed or the response “ SCP not needed” is selected. 2) SCP not needed- the BPA will never trigger again for that patient. 3) Don’t know/still on treatment-the BPA will re-fire in 30 days. Data on frequency of BPA firing and number of referrals was compared 90 days prior and post implementation. Chi-square analysis was used. Results: Between 4/1/2015-3/31/2016, 902 patients were seen with stage 0-III breast cancer at Northwestern. Ninety days prior to implementation of the BPA, 30 patients (3.3%) were referred by 8 oncology providers. In the 90 days following implementation, the BPA fired 845 times (48.5% option 1, 24.8% option 2, 26.6% option 3) and 198 patients (22%) were referred. The difference was statistically significant ( χ 2 = 141.7, p < 0.0001). Conclusions: The implementation of BPAs within an EMR is an effective way to increase referrals to a survivorship clinic, thus increasing the number of patients given SCPs. Challenges identified were having enough staff availible to deal with a rapid increase in referrals, need for refinement of BPA criteria to more precisely identify eligible patients, and provider burden.