Scottish Radiotherapy Patient Experience Survey 2014: National Results: Volume 1

4 RESULTS: INFORMATION BEFORE RADIOTHERAPY TREATMENT

Summary

4.1 Scores were generally high across most of the questions in this section but there were some which gave a more mixed picture. Of those who do receive information, most are happy with what they get. There are still some patients who don't receive the information they need however. Most patients (77%) were invited to the radiotherapy department before they started treatment, and virtually all of these (98%) found this helpful. But some patients said that they didn't get any written information before their radiotherapy treatment (14%), and/or that it wasn't of the right quality to help with their treatment.

Detailed results

4.2 The questions on information before treatment asked included: the information they were given and whether this was easy to understand; whether they had been able to visit the radiotherapy department prior to treatment starting; and whether they were given more broad information on local support services. The results are summarised in table 2.

Table 2 Summary of the results to questions about information before radiotherapy treatment

Note: percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

4.3 In general the responses were mixed. Of those people who do receive information, most find it helpful and easy to understand. For example:

• 90% of patients said that the information/arrangements for their first radiotherapy visit was easy to understand.
• 55% of patients said that the information given to them before they started treatment was excellent, and helped with their treatment. Another 43% said that it was satisfactory, and met their needs. (chart 5)
• 77% of patients said that they were invited to visit the radiotherapy department before they started treatment, to be given information and an explanation about radiotherapy. The vast majority of these (98%) said that it was helpful.

4.4 However, there were some patients who said they didn't receive the information they required and if they did, some found that it wasn't easy to understand. For example:

• 14% of patients said that they didn't get any written information before they started their radiotherapy treatment, and a further 5% couldn't remember if they been sent or given any
• Of those who did receive information, 9% said that it was only easy to understand to some extent, and small number (1%) said that it wasn't easy to understand at all.
• Almost one-third (27%) said that they didn't get any information about the local cancer and information support services; and a large number (12%) said that they didn't know/couldn't remember this.
• A small number (2%) said that the amount of information given to them before starting radiotherapy was poor, and didn't help much; 5 patients said that it was very poor, and didn't help at all; and 1% said that they were not given any information before their radiotherapy started.
• Over in in five (23%) patients said that they weren't invited to visit the radiotherapy department before their treatment started. Most of these (61%) said that it would have been helpful; a smaller number (39%) said that it wouldn't have been helpful.

Variation between centres

4.5 In the main there was little variation between the five radiotherapy centres. The exception to this was on the following questions:

• Information before radiotherapy - scores ranged from 74% to 94% positive, with Dundee Cancer Centre doing particularly well.
• Told about local cancer and information support service - scores ranged from 66% to 88% positive, with Department of Clinical Oncology (Inverness) doing particularly well.

Chart 5 Overall amount of information given before starting radiotherapy (%)