Access of patients with breast and lung cancer to chemotherapy treatment in public and private hospitals in the city of Buenos Aires

RECONDO, GONZALO; COSACOW, CÉSAR; CUTULI, HERNÁN JAVIER; CERMIGNANI, LUCIANO; STRAMINSKY, SAMANTA; NAVEIRA, MARTIN; PITZZU, MARTIN; DE RONATO, GABRIELA; NACUZZI, GABRIELA; TAETTI, GONZALO; CORSICO, SANTIAGO; BERRUETA, MABEL; COLUCCI, GIULIANA; GIBBONS, LUZ; GUTIERREZ, LAURA; GARCÍA-ELORRIO, EZEQUIEL

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL FOR QUALITY IN HEALTH CARE

OXFORD UNIV PRESS

Año: 2019 vol. 31 p. 682 - 690

1353-4505

Objectives: Describe the time elapsed from the diagnosis to treatment with chemotherapy for patients with breast and lung cancer at public and private hospitals in Buenos Aires. Design: Retrospective cohort study. Setting: Three public and three private academic hospitals in Buenos Aires. Participants: Patients with breast (n = 168) or lung cancer (n = 100) diagnosis treated with chemotherapy. Main outcomes measures: Clinical and sociodemographic data were collected in a stratified sample. We used the Kaplan?Meier estimator to analyse the time elapsed and the log rank test to compare both groups Results: For breast cancer patients, median time elapsed between diagnosis and treatment with chemotherapy was 76 days (95% CI: 64?86) in public and 60 days (95% CI: 52?65) in private hospitals (P = 0.0001). For adjuvant and neoadjuvant treatments, median time was 130 (95% CI: 109?159) versus 64 (95% CI: 56?73) days (P < 0.0001) and 57 days (95% CI: 49?75) versus 26 (95% CI: 16?41) days, respectively (P = 0.0002). There were no significant differences in the time from first consultation to diagnosis. In patients with lung cancer, median time from diagnosis to treatment was 71 days (95% CI: 60?83) in public hospitals and 31 days (95% CI: 24?39) in private hospitals (P = 0.0002). In the metastatic setting, median time to treatment was 63 days (95% CI: 45?83) in public and 33 (95% CI: 26?44) days in private hospitals (P = 0.005). Conclusions: There are significant disparity in the access to treatment with chemotherapy for patients in Buenos Aires, Argentina.