Large surveys of cancer patients help encourage and inform quality improvements in how health services and care are designed and delivered. These surveys also provide new opportunities for research about inequalities in the processes and outcomes of cancer care.
In England, the Cancer Patient Experience Surveys have been conducted annually since 2010, with high-profile survey findings highlighting high- and low-performing hospitals as well as issues concerning regional variation in care quality. However, researchers need to remember to factor in a number of considerations when interpreting the data and using the findings from such surveys....
The remainder of this commentary is available on statisticsviews.com.
Catherine Saunders is a statistician at the Cambridge Centre for Health Services Research and a former analyst at RAND Europe. Gary Abel is a senior statistician at the University of Exeter.
This commentary originally appeared on Statistics Views on July 15, 2016. Commentary gives RAND researchers a platform to convey insights based on their professional expertise and often on their peer-reviewed research and analysis.
