Socio-economic inequalities in stage at diagnosis, and in time intervals on the lung cancer pathway from first symptom to treatment: systematic review and meta-analysis.

ABSTRACT: Cancer diagnosis at an early stage increases the chance of curative treatment and of survival. It has been suggested that delays on the pathway from first symptom to diagnosis and treatment may be socio-economically patterned, and contribute to socio-economic differences in receipt of treatment and in cancer survival. This review aimed to assess the published evidence for socio-economic inequalities in stage at diagnosis of lung cancer, and in the length of time spent on the lung cancer pathway. MEDLINE, EMBASE and CINAHL databases were searched to locate cohort studies of adults with a primary diagnosis of lung cancer, where the outcome was stage at diagnosis or the length of time spent within an interval on the care pathway, or a suitable proxy measure, analysed according to a measure of

SUBMITTER: Forrest LF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5390856 | biostudies-literature | 2017 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature