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Background: Cancer screening participation rates in Germany differ depending on patients’ gender. International studies have found that patient–physician gender concordance fosters recommendation and conducting of cancer screening, and especially cancer screening for women.
Objectives: We aimed to ascertain whether gender concordance influences general practitioners' (GPs’) rating of the usefulness of cancer screening, as well as their recommendations and readiness to conduct cancer screening in general practice in Germany.
Methods: For an exploratory cross-sectional survey, 500 randomly selected GPs from all over Germany were asked to fill in a questionnaire on cancer screening in general practice between March and June 2015. We asked them to rate the usefulness of each cancer screening examination, how frequently they recommended and conducted them and whether they viewed GPs or specialists as responsible for carrying them out. We used multiple logistic regression to analyse gender effect size by calculating odds ratios.
Results: Our study sample consisted of 139 GPs of which 65% were male. Male and female GPs did not differ significantly in their rating of the general usefulness of any of the specified cancer screening examinations. Male GPs were 2.9 to 6.8 times as likely to consider GPs responsible for recommending and conducting PSA testing and digital rectal examinations and were 3.7 to 7.9 times as likely to recommend and conduct these examinations on a regular basis.
Conclusion: Patient–physician gender concordance made it more likely that male-specific cancer screenings would be recommended and conducted, but not female-specific screenings.
Objective: Our aim was to explore whether general practitioners (GPs) communicate with cancer patients on complementary and integrative medicine (CIM) in a patient-centred and case-specific manner.
Methods: We designed two cases of standardised breast cancer patients and allocated 29 GPs to hold a consultation either with Case 1 or Case 2. Case 1 presented with fears of possible physical side effects of hormone treatment. Case 2 feared a loss in social functioning because of nausea and emesis as possible side effects of chemotherapy. Consultations were audiotaped and analysed using the Roter Interaction Analysis System (RIAS). We analysed whether recommended CIM treatments and GPs' focus on psychosocial or medical and therapy-related content differed according to whether they were counselling Case 1 or Case 2.
Results: In consultations with Case 1, GPs rather focused on medical and therapy-related content and most often recommended mistletoe, diets and sports. In contrast, GPs focused on psychosocial content and they most often recommended methods of self-care when counselling Case 2.
Conclusion: The GPs in our sample reacted case-specifically to the patients' interest in CIM. Such responsive and patient-centred communication is a valuable resource but is often time-consuming. Adequate training and reimbursement should therefore be considered for GPs.