Most people understand that early diagnosis and treatment of cancer is generally important to successful treatment. However, it is not uncommon for patients and/or their doctors to fail to follow up when regular medical testing reveals abnormal cancer related findings. This kind of delay can be deadly.

To address this problem, researchers at Baylor University College of Medicine and Veterans Affairs Medical Center created a computer algorithm designed to prompted doctors to follow up with patients. The algorithm works with primary care physicians’ existing electronic medical records. It searches the records and uses electronic “triggers” to flag patients who have certain abnormal clinical findings for additional review and follow up.

The researchers tested their algorithm and their findings are published in the August 2015 issue of Journal of Clinical Oncology in a paper titled “Electronic Trigger-Based Intervention to Reduce Delays in Diagnostic Evaluation for Cancer: A Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial.” This study is available online here:

[Electronic Trigger-Based Intervention to Reduce Delays in Diagnostic Evaluation for Cancer: A Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial (http://jco.ascopubs.org/content/early/2015/08/21/JCO.2015.61.1301.long)

Researchers found the algorithm and electronic triggers were effective in reducing the time it took to get patients to get evaluated for colon and prostate cancer. In addition, it improved the proportion of patients with cancer findings who received follow-up testing.

This kind of electronic reminder system is a wonderful development. Delay in diagnosing and treating cancer can cause additional medical complications, and can even be fatal. This kind of electronic reminder system should reduce follow-up failures. Indeed, it is likely similar algorithms can be created to improve timeliness of diagnosis and follow-up for other serious medical conditions like other types of cancers, heart disease and stroke.