Effect of provider and patient reminders, deployment of nurse practitioners, and financial incentives on cervical and breast cancer screening rates.

OBJECTIVE

To evaluate the effect of the Provider and Patient Reminders in Ontario: Multi-Strategy Prevention Tools (P-PROMPT) reminder and recall system and pay-for-performance incentives on the delivery rates of cervical and breast cancer screening in primary care practices in Ontario, with or without deployment of nurse practitioners (NPs).

DESIGN

Before-and-after comparisons of the time-appropriate delivery rates of cervical and breast cancer screening using the automated and NP-augmented strategies of the P-PROMPT reminder and recall system.

SETTING

Southwestern Ontario.

PARTICIPANTS

A total of 232 physicians from 24 primary care network or family health network groups across 110 different sites eligible for pay-for-performance incentives.

INTERVENTIONS

The P-PROMPT project combined pay-for-performance incentives with provider and patient reminders and deployment of NPs to enhance the delivery of preventive care services.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES

The mean delivery rates at the practice level of time-appropriate mammograms and Papanicolaou tests completed within the previous 30 months.

RESULTS

Before-and-after comparisons of time-appropriate delivery rates (< 30 months) of cancer screening showed the rates of Pap tests and mammograms for eligible women significantly increased over a 1-year period by 6.3% (P < .001) and 5.3% (P < .001), respectively. The NP-augmented strategy achieved comparable rate increases to the automated strategy alone in the delivery rates of both services.

CONCLUSION

The use of provider and patient reminders and pay-for-performance incentives resulted in increases in the uptake of Pap tests and mammograms among eligible primary care patients over a 1-year period in family practices in Ontario.