Exploring Clinicians' Perspectives of Barriers to Chemotherapy-Induced Peripheral Neuropathy Assessment and Management in Oncology Practice: A Qualitative Analysis of Semi-structured Interviews.

BACKGROUND

Quantitative reports suggest that the assessment and management of chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN) in practice is suboptimal.

OBJECTIVE

The purpose of this qualitative analysis was to explore clinician-related perspectives of CIPN assessment, management, and the use of a CIPN decision support tool.

METHODS

Clinicians from the breast oncology, gastrointestinal oncology, or multiple myeloma disease centers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute who interacted with a CIPN clinician decision support algorithm were eligible to participate in the semi-structured interviews. The interview guide included questions about CIPN assessment, management, and clinician-decision support tool use. All interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and analyzed using inductive content analysis.

RESULTS

Of the 39 eligible clinicians, 15 agreed to be interviewed. Interviewed clinicians were mainly physicians (73.3) and White, non-Hispanic (93.3%). Main themes from the interviews included (1) CIPN management practice patterns (eg, endorsement of non-recommended management strategies or lack of standardization for chemotherapy dose reduction) and barriers (eg, insurance prior authorizations required for duloxetine prescription), (2) CIPN assessment practice patterns (eg, use of subjective instead of objective CIPN assessment approaches) and barriers (eg, difficult to interpret patients' CIPN report between visits), and (3) utilization of the clinician decision support tool (eg, all assessment tasks lead to same management options).

CONCLUSIONS

There are several barriers to clinicians' use of evidence-based CIPN assessment and management strategies.

IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE

Future work should be focused on addressing barriers to duloxetine prescription, developing evidence-based CIPN assessment and management strategies, improving symptom monitoring, and facilitating referrals to existing supportive care services.