Provider Prompting to Improve Colorectal Cancer Screening Rates

Abstract

Colorectal cancer (CRC) screening is recommended for average risk adults aged 50 to 75 years. Healthy People 2020 objectives include reducing new cancer cases and the illness, disability, and deaths secondary to cancer. Effective CRC screening may prevent cancer through detection and removal of precancerous growths, and may detect cancer in early stages where treatment can lead to a cure. CRC screening rates at an Eastern North Carolina Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) were unacceptably low. This Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) project implements provider prompting, including an electronic medical record (EMR) reminder and the use of a daily patient list, to help improve provider compliance with offering CRC screening and to improve CRC screening rates. An EMR data mining issue was discovered during implementation, raising baseline CRC completed screening rates from 43.6% to 49.3%. After an eight-week project implementation period, completed CRC screenings increased from 49.3% at baseline to 56.8%. Simple, cost-effective interventions led to a significant increase in completed screenings. The organization will need to further evaluate if other documentation errors could be artificially driving down other key performance values.