Discussions with patients about referral pathways and costs in the diagnosis and treatment of colorectal cancer in Victoria, Australia

Health insurance status is one example, with improved survival associated with private insurance compared with public healthcare provision.3'4 Although quality of care, access to treatment and disease complexity might contribute to insurance-related differences,5 features of the cancer pathway...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inAustralian family physician Vol. 53; no. 1/2; pp. 70 - 77
Main Authors Bergin, Rebecca J, Yu, Angus Yao-Dong, White, Victoria, Emery, Jon D
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Sydney Copyright Agency Limited (Distributor) 01.01.2024
Subjects
Colonoscopy
Colorectal cancer
Consent
Cost control
Decision making
Ethics
Health care expenditures
Health care policy
Health insurance
Interviews
Medical diagnosis
Patients
Perceptions
Qualitative research
Victoria Australia
Australia
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Summary:Health insurance status is one example, with improved survival associated with private insurance compared with public healthcare provision.3'4 Although quality of care, access to treatment and disease complexity might contribute to insurance-related differences,5 features of the cancer pathway before initial treatment are also important. [...]delays in primary and secondary care are associated with CRC outcomes;6 hence, differences in waiting time to access diagnostic tests or commence treatment might contribute to survival variation by insurance status.7 Health insurance status is also associated with different costs of care. Coding was largely inductive, with themes generated and organised while collating data, while also drawing on definitions of time intervals and factors affecting timeliness of care as described in the model of pathways to treatment to assist in understanding and coding the data.17,18 For example, the theme 'perceptions of waiting time' includes patient factors (perceived length of time being acceptable or not), healthcare provider (eg care delayed by GP) and system factors (eg public versus private hospital waiting time). Themes Four themes, with several subthemes, were identified: (1) experience of out-of-pocket costs and discussions about healthcare costs; (2) perceptions of waiting time; (3) choice of services/care provider; and (4) views of private health insurance and healthcare system choice.
ISSN:2208-7958