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A Snapshot of Patients’ Perceptions of Oncology Providers’ Cultural Competence

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Abstract

In this paper, we describe an anonymous cross-sectional survey with a sample of 100 racially diverse adult oncology patients using a newly developed patient-reported measure of providers’ cultural competence, the Physicians’ Cultural Competence for Patient Satisfaction Scale (PCCPS) [1, 2], which was developed using a US midwestern sample of primary care patients. Our primary aims were to examine the reliability of the PCCPS in a more racially diverse urban oncology clinical setting and to identify salient domains of oncology provider cultural competence based on patient-reported satisfaction with direct clinical encounters. Results suggest that patient-reported satisfaction was significantly associated with one of the four domains measured by the PCCPS, physician’s patient-centered cultural competence (r = 0.40, p = 0.01), and female patients were more satisfied (t (91) = 5.23, p = 0.02). The PCCPS demonstrated good reliability in an urban diverse cancer patient population. Results help to inform the development of clinical tools that can improve oncology providers’ cultural competency.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the patients who volunteered for this pilot study at such a challenging time in their lives and the oncologists and medical staff who helped with the survey study, especially Dr. Ari Brooks and Dr. Lydia Komarnicky.

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Correspondence to Maureen P. Davey.

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Davey, M.P., Waite, R., Nuñez, A. et al. A Snapshot of Patients’ Perceptions of Oncology Providers’ Cultural Competence. J Canc Educ 29, 657–664 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13187-014-0619-9

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