ArticleThe British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners2011
Urgent suspected cancer referrals from general practice: audit of compliance with guidelines and referral outcomes.
Article in The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners, 2011. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 35 papers, 6 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
35 citing papers in PubMed, 6 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- A Bibliometric Analysis and Visualization of Decision Support Systems for Healthcare Referral Strategies.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Pooled it
- Factors affecting the decision to investigate older adults with potential cancer symptoms: a systematic review.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2022Pooled it
- Interventions to reduce the time to diagnosis of brain tumours.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2020Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Systematic review of clinical features of suspected prostate cancer in primary care.Canadian family physician Medecin de famille canadien · 2015Pooled it
- GP referrals for suspected cancer in Ireland: protocol for a cross-sectional study (GRACCHUS).HRB open research · 2025Article
- The Role of Smoking Status in Making Risk-Informed Diagnostic Decisions in the Lung Cancer Pathway: A Qualitative Study of Health Care Professionals and Patients.Medical decision making : an international journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making · 2024Article
- Model for Achieving a Coordinated Access to Lung Cancer Care in Selected Public Health Facilities in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa: Protocol for a Qualitative Study.JMIR research protocols · 2023Article
- Diagnostic accuracy for colorectal cancer of a quantitative faecal immunochemical test in symptomatic primary care patients: a study protocol.Diagnostic and prognostic research · 2022Article
- Melanoma Diagnostic Practices of French-Speaking Belgian General Practitioners and the Prospective Study of Their Pigmented Skin Lesion Diagnostic Accuracy and Management.Journal of cancer education : the official journal of the American Association for Cancer Education · 2021Observational
- Article
- Time from presentation to pre-diagnostic chest X-ray in patients with symptomatic lung cancer: a cohort study using electronic patient records from English primary care.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2021Article
- Investigating cancer symptoms in older people: what are the issues and where is the evidence?The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2020Article
- An open structure questionnaire on reasons for delay in presentation: a study of patients attending clinic with red flag symptoms of head and neck cancer.European archives of oto-rhino-laryngology : official journal of the European Federation of Oto-Rhino-Laryngological Societies (EUFOS) : affiliated with the German Society for Oto-Rhino-Laryngology - Head and Neck Surgery · 2020Article
- Association between use of urgent suspected cancer referral and mortality and stage at diagnosis: a 5-year national cohort study.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2020Article
- Development of an intervention to expedite cancer diagnosis through primary care: a protocol.BJGP open · 2018Article
- How long is too long? A scoping review of health system delays in lung cancer.European respiratory review : an official journal of the European Respiratory Society · 2018Article
- The value of using the faecal immunochemical test in general practice on patients presenting with non-alarm symptoms of colorectal cancer.British journal of cancer · 2018Article
- Variation and statistical reliability of publicly reported primary care diagnostic activity indicators for cancer: a cross-sectional ecological study of routine data.BMJ quality & safety · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
- Commented on by
- Commented on by
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundLate diagnosis contributes to the UK having poorer cancer survival than many countries in Europe. Cancer referral guidelines help GPs decide which patients to refer urgently for further investigation.
aimTo examine primary care referral patterns, compliance with referral guidance, and eventual outcome for patients. DESIGN AND
settingProspective audit within general practice in Scotland.
methodGPs in Scotland reviewed all urgent suspected cancer referrals over a 6-month period. They noted the final diagnosis and assessed whether the referral was in accordance with agreed referral guidelines.
resultsA total of 18 775 urgent suspected cancer referrals were analysed from 516 GP practices. The referral rate ranged from 3.7 to 24.0 per 1000 per annum; 30.8% of referrals were for patients aged under 50 years, yet this age group accounts for only 11.1% of all diagnosed cancers; 10.3% of all urgent cancer referrals were for suspected melanoma, despite this cancer accounting for only 4.1% of new cancers. The proportion of patients subsequently diagnosed with cancer was greatest for leukaemia (61.7%), prostate (52.6%), and lung cancer referrals (39.7%), and lowest for melanoma (11.8%), oesophago-gastric (11.2%), brain (10.6%), and laryngeal cancer referrals (7.8%). Compliance with referral guidelines was 90.9%. A large proportion of referrals considered to be outside the guidelines still had a cancer diagnosed (urological 15.9%, lung 8.8%, colorectal 8.4%, and breast 6.4%).
conclusionThere is wide variation in GP referral rates for suspected cancer with a greater than expected proportion of referrals for younger people. Many referrals considered to be outside the national guidelines were diagnosed with cancer, suggesting factors other than those in referral guidelines alert GPs to the possibility of cancer.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.