Risk of cancer and repeated urgent referral after negative investigation for cancer.

Introduction: Many countries have implemented cancer patient pathways (CPPs) for organ-specific cancers. However, due to high symptom diversity, it can be difficult for the General Practitioner (GP) to decide on the appropriate CPP.

Objective: The aim of this study was to estimate the proportion of patients who were referred to a second CPP, were diagnosed with cancer or died within 6 months after receiving a negative result from clinical investigation through an initial CPP.

Methods: We conducted a historical cohort study using routinely collected data with 6 months of follow-up. Data were collected from Danish registries.

Results: We included 109998 study subjects: 0.6% received a cancer diagnosis, 2.3% died and 6.1% were referred to a second CPP within 6 months. A total of 48.9% of the re-referrals after a first CPP in the gastrointestinal (GI) area were also referred to a second CPP in the GI area. Re-referral to a second CPP corresponded to a positive predictive value (PPV) of 4.4% to be diagnosed with cancer.

Conclusion: A total of 6% of patients who received a negative result after investigation in an organ-specific CPP were re-referred within 6 months to a new organ-specific CPP; many of these were in the same anatomical area as the first CPP. The PPV of 4.4% to be diagnosed with cancer indicates that some cancers may be missed in the diagnostic investigation through the first CPP. This calls for reconsideration of how CPPs may best support the primary cancer diagnosis.