Table 3.

Descriptive Characteristics by Receipt of Guideline-Concordant Care among Continuously Enrolled Medicare Fee-for-Service Beneficiaries with Incident Lung Cancer Diagnosis in West Virginia, 2003 through 2006

	Proportion (%)#
	Appropriateness of Care@		Timeliness of Care∼
Characteristics	Guideline-Concordant	Guideline-Discordant	Timely Care	Delayed Care
Overall, n (%)	444 (46.5%)	511 (53.5%)	1,118 (78.7%)	302 (21.3%)
Lung cancer type^
NSCLC	47.2	52.8	76.8	23.2
SCLC	40	60	90.2	9.9
AJCC TNM stage^
I	89.2	10.8	74	26
II	65.4	34.6	74.4	25.6
III	84.8	15.2	79.2	20.8
IV	n/a	n/a	82.8	17.2
Age (years)+
66–69	51.8	48.2	78.6	21.4
70–74	53.9	46.1	80.4	19.6
75–79	45	55	77.8	22.2
≥80	30.4	69.6	77.2	22.8
Sex+
Male	42.9	57.1	79.9	20.1
Female	51.2	48.8	77.2	22.8
Race
Nonwhite	38.9	61.1	66.7	33.3
White	46.7	53.3	78.9	21.1
Urban–rural residence
Metro	46.8	53.2	76.6	23.4
Urban	47.2	52.8	80.9	19.1
Rural	39.6	60.4	83.5	16.5
Comorbidity, Charlson score
0	45	55	77.2	22.8
1	49.3	50.7	80.2	19.8
≥2	45.6	54.4	78.6	21.4

NSCLC, non-small cell lung cancer; SCLC, small cell lung cancer; AJCC, American Joint Committee on Cancer; TNM,Tumor Node Metastasis.

^@Guideline-concordant appropriate care determined using American College of Chest Physicians evidence-based guidelines for diagnosis and management of lung cancer, January 2003.

^∼Guideline-concordant timely lung cancer care determined using British Thoracic Society and RAND Corporation clinical opinion-based guidelines for management of lung cancer.

^#Row percentages.

⁺Association between beneficiary characteristics and receipt of guideline-concordant appropriate care; chi-square test (P≤0.05).

^{^}Association between beneficiary characteristics and receipt of guideline-concordant timely care; chi-square test (P≤0.05).

Source: West Virginia Cancer Registry-Medicare linked data files, 2002–2007.