Background: Within the framework of a multi-annual educational intervention sponsored by the Ministry of Health and regional health authorities, patterns of the care delivered to breast cancer patients in Italian general hospitals were monitored in order to identify areas of practice whose quality was in need of improvement.
Design: Information on the diagnostic and therapeutic procedures in 63 general hospitals in eight Italian regions performed in 1724 consecutive breast cancer patients were retrospectively gathered from medical records. Quality of care was assessed by a diagnostic and therapeutic score based on the observed degree of compliance with previously established courses of action.
Results: The median value of the overall diagnostic and staging score was 60%. About one-third of surgical operations (38%) were inappropriate: one-fourth (24%) of patients with stage I-II disease had unnecessarily radical surgery (i.e., Halsted mastectomy), and limited surgery in patients with small tumors (i.e., < or = 2 cm) was under utilized. Chronological age influenced physicians' behaviour: elderly patients were more likely to have a less intensive diagnostic work-up and less appropriate surgical treatment (with more frequent performance of an unnecessary radical operation and a less frequent utilization of limited surgery), independently of their overall health status. The presence of one or more co-existent diseases was associated with a failure to undergo axillary clearance and with a lower utilization of conservative surgery independently of age.
Conclusion: In accord with others, this study confirms the existence of a clinically important effect of patient age on diagnostic and therapeutic behaviour and the use of unnecessarily radical surgery procedures. The paper discusses the implications of these findings for the next stage of the educational project, in which practice guidelines will be developed and implemented to improve the quality of care for breast cancer patients.