Patterns of health services utilization in the last two weeks of life among cancer patients: Experience in an Australian academic cancer center.

Aim: To report the trend in end-of-life health services (HS) utilization among cancer patients treated in a large Australian academic cancer center over a 12-year period.

Methods: This is a retrospective study of cancer patients treated at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre (PMCC), who had documented death between January 2002 and December 2013. Using administrative and billing database, we report on the utilization of different categories of HS within two weeks of death: diagnostic investigations (pathology and radiology), inpatient and outpatient services, and potentially futile interventions (PFI, which include radiotherapy, chemotherapy and surgery).

Tolerability and outcomes of curative radiotherapy in patients aged 85 or more years.

Objectives: To assess the tolerability and survival outcome of curative radiotherapy in patients over the age of 85 years.

Design, Setting, And Participants: Retrospective analysis of all patients aged over 85 years who received radiotherapy as part of curative treatment for any cancer (excluding insignificant skin cancers) at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre between 1 January 2000 and 1 January 2010.

Main Outcome Measures: Poor treatment tolerability (defined as hospital admission during radiotherapy, treatment break, or early treatment cessation); predictors for poor treatment tolerability, overall survival and cancer-specific survival.

Patterns of retreatment with radiotherapy in a large academic centre.

Aims: To characterise retreatment rates with radiotherapy at a large multifacility academic radiotherapy centre and assess the effect of distance on retreatment rate.

Materials And Methods: Electronic administrative records were reviewed for patients receiving radiotherapy between 1998 and 2010 at regional and metropolitan facilities. Course-level data were reconstructed from electronic administrative databases.