Establishing population-based surveillance of diagnostic timeliness using linked cancer registry and administrative data for patients with colorectal and lung cancer

Diagnostic timeliness in cancer patients is important for clinical outcomes and patient satisfaction but, to-date, continuous monitoring of diagnostic intervals in nationwide incident cohorts has been impossible in England.We developed a new methodology for measuring the secondary care diagnostic interval (SCDI - first relevant secondary care contact to diagnosis) using linked cancer registration and healthcare utilisation data. Using this...