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BACKGROUND: We prospectively examined the effect of a multilingual, multidisciplinary patient navigation and essential needs access program on oncology treatment completion and patient-reported outcomes among medically underserved patients with cancer. Medically underserved patients have limited socioeconomic/geographic access to medical care. PATIENTS AND METHODS: We conducted an unblinded, 2-arm randomized controlled trial among patients with stage I-III cancer at 2 New York City safety-net cancer clinics (2013-2016), where social work and appointment navigation support were generally available. Patients were randomized by permuted block to either the Integrated Cancer Care Access Network (ICCAN) intervention or the institution's usual and customary care (U U 64% preferred English, and 36% preferred Spanish. Treatment completion was higher in the ICCAN arm compared with the U P=.022). Both arms showed improvements in EQ-5D (effect sizes ES: U ICCAN, 1.47), PHQ-9 (U ICCAN, 1.33), and PSS-4 scores (U ICCAN, 1.13). Improvements in EQ-5D (P=.001), PHQ-9 (P=.046), and PSS-4 (P=.001) scores were significantly greater among patients in the ICCAN arm. CONCLUSIONS: Patients in the ICCAN arm had significantly better treatment completion and patient-reported outcomes than those receiving U&C. Future studies should explore service utilization and resource access to clarify the reasons for these differences. Comprehensive multidisciplinary patient navigation may improve outcomes for underserved patients with cancer. CLINICALTRIALS: gov identifier: NCT01742143.
Gany et al. (Tue,) studied this question.