Testing for prostate and colorectal cancer: comparison of self-report and medical record audit.

Background: Self-reported data are often used to determine cancer screening test utilization, but self-report may be inaccurate.

Methods: We interviewed members of three health maintenance organizations and reviewed their medical records for information on digital rectal exam (DRE), prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test, fecal occult blood test (FOBT), sigmoidoscopy, and colonoscopy (response rate 65%). We calculated the sensitivity, specificity, concordance, and kappa statistic to compare the two sources for black men (n = 363), white and other men (n = 847), and women (n = 920) by study location.