Practices and Organizations Related to Emerging Occupations of Care (EPOCK) Coordination in Oncology

Several stakeholders are implied in cancer care pathways and there is a need to coordinate their actions. New occupations of care coordination have thus emerged, such as nurse coordinator in France (IDEC: Infirmière de Coordination). However, the conditions of their efficiency are not well known. Moreover, several other complementary approaches and nurse occupations have to be identified because of their contribution to care coordination (IDE TAS, IPO, IDE AMA, IDE-CO, IDE HAD-CAD, IDE ETP)*. Finally, all together, these interventions of care coordination appeared as complex and asked for a theoretical model. Because of this high variability of the practices, without an underlying model, the impact of care coordination on patient quality of life, safety and efficiency of care is difficult to assess. In this context, the main objective is to propose a modeling of care coordination and associated emerging occupations by comparing theoretical expected outcomes to professionals, patients and caregivers representations.

The pilot observational study is based on three distinct stages: (1) the definition of care coordination in oncology using a literature review and a Delphi consensus study; (2) the description of practices, contexts, perceptions and attitudes related to care coordination occupations in oncology using a qualitative and a cross-sectional quantitative survey; (3) the comparison of the practices to the theoretical model to propose a modeling of care coordination occupations in oncology.

Inclusion criteria

• For health institutions: public or private institutions in which nurses contributing to care coordination. Each institution will be associated with one type of coordination occupation, even if other healthcare workers contribute to care coordination in the same institution.
• For professionals of care coordination: nurses contributing to care coordination in oncology (IDEC , IDE TAS, IPO, IDE AMA, IDE-CO, IDE HAD-CAD or IDE ETP)
• For professionals working with professionals of care coordination:

• Medical and non-medical healthcare professionals (oncologist, surgeon, nurses…), administrative professionals (secretary…), professionals of supportive care (psychologists, social workers…) and volunteers in patient organizations.
• Private practitioners: general practitioner, private nurses, pharmacist
• For the patients : adults under supervision of the selected professionals of care coordination for at least four weeks and able to express themselves
• For the caregivers: family caregivers of the selected patients.

Exclusion criteria

• For health institutions: private healthcare networks, territorial support platforms, home-based care providers, healthcare houses
• For professionals of care coordination: coordinating medical doctors of care networks, coordinating medical doctors of hospital care at home, practitioners of regional cancer networks.
• For the patients: <18 years old