TY - JOUR AU - Schroeder, Mary C. AU - Chapman, Cole G. AU - Nattinger, Matthew C. AU - Halfdanarson, Thorvardur R. AU - Abu-Hejleh, Taher AU - Tien, Yu-Yu AU - Brooks, John M. PY - 2016 DA - 2016/07/18 TI - Variation in geographic access to chemotherapy by definitions of providers and service locations: a population-based observational study JO - BMC Health Services Research SP - 274 VL - 16 IS - 1 AB - An aging population, with its associated rise in cancer incidence and strain on the oncology workforce, will continue to motivate patients, healthcare providers and policy makers to better understand the existing and growing challenges of access to chemotherapy. Administrative data, and SEER-Medicare data in particular, have been used to assess patterns of healthcare utilization because of its rich information regarding patients, their treatments, and their providers. To create measures of geographic access to chemotherapy, patients and oncologists must first be identified. Others have noted that identifying chemotherapy providers from Medicare claims is not always straightforward, as providers may report multiple or incorrect specialties and/or practice in multiple locations. Although previous studies have found that specialty codes alone fail to identify all oncologists, none have assessed whether various methods of identifying chemotherapy providers and their locations affect estimates of geographic access to care. SN - 1472-6963 UR - https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-016-1549-5 DO - 10.1186/s12913-016-1549-5 ID - Schroeder2016 ER -