A patient reminder to improve colorectal cancer screenings

Colorectal cancer screenings detect the early, treatable, and often curable stages of the disease. Screenings are now recommended beginning at 45 years of age. Health care providers are expected to have patient's complete screenings, and reimbursement rates can be affected if results are not documented.

An independent review of expected organizational core measures revealed inadequate colorectal cancer screenings completed and no formal patient outreach program for patients who had not completed ordered screenings. The lack of a formal reminder to patients resulted in a cumulative completion rate of 19%.

A phone call intervention was designed to notify patients of the need to complete colorectal cancer screenings. A preimplementation and postimplementation design was used to compare completed colorectal cancer screenings.

Patients with ordered colorectal cancer screenings received one reminder phone call to complete the screening. Preintervention and postintervention completion rates were evaluated using data from the electronic medical record.

Results revealed a colorectal cancer screening rate of 19% preimplementation and 43% postimplementation and reflected a 61.9% increase in cumulative completion rates over a 12-week intervention period.

The colorectal cancer patient reminder intervention showed clinical significance in improving completion rates of colorectal cancer screenings. The intervention was a successful method to improve patient compliance with the expected screening and helped improve provider core measure expectations.