Peter Vedsted

We know that in Denmark some 90% of citizens have contact with family practice (FP) during a year and around 40% has contact with secondary care.  This demands efforts to create integrated and shared care.

The aim of this study is to document the pattern of contacts with FP among patients recently diagnosed with cancer and among previous cancer patients.

Materials and methods:

In a nationwide database in Denmark (population 5.5 million) all contacts to the health care system are registered.

We describe the pattern of contact with all parts of the health care system for a) the total population b) about 33,000 patients diagnosed with cancer in 2007, and c) about 220,000 patients living with a previous diagnosis of cancer.       

Results:

Data for the total population is known. The total number of contacts with FP in daytime is about 38.4 million, with out of hours service about 2.9 million, and with specialized service about 8.8 million. Details for the total population and for the two groups of cancer patients will be presented at the conference, and their implications will be discussed.               

Conclusions:

This project will give insight into the extent to which patients who have recently undergone treatment and patients in the survivorship phase of cancer use different parts of the health care system, and how much they use FP.

Information about this will enable us to discuss the need for shared care, integrated care and information exchange and create a platform for further in-depth analysis of needed assessment and quality of care.