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Research in cancer care disparities in countries with universal healthcare: mapping the field and its conceptual contours

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Abstract

The paper reviews published studies focused on disparities in receipt of cancer treatments and supportive care services in countries where cancer care is free at the point of access. We map these studies in terms of the equity stratifiers they examined, the countries in which they took place, and the care settings and cancer populations they investigated. Based on this map, we reflect on patterns of scholarly attention to equity and disparity in cancer care. We then consider conceptual challenges and opportunities in the field, including how treatment disparities are defined, how equity stratifiers are defined and conceptualized and how disparities are explained, with special attention to the challenge of psychosocial explanations.

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Notes

  1. To suggest that people who are socially marginalized receive inadequate healthcare because they ‘participate less actively’ in their healthcare is arguably tantamount to saying that people who are powerless do not get the care they need because they do not exercise power… circular reasoning, and an especially egregious form of victim blaming.

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Acknowledgements

The Canadian Institutes of Health Research funded the study Negotiating Equity: Toward the elimination of disparities in cancer care (FRN 82869); PI (first author) was supported by a CIHR New Investigator Award. Many thanks to librarian Maureen Rice for devising and articulating the literature search strategy.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Social Work & Department of Health, Aging and Society, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

    Christina Sinding

  2. McMaster Evidence Review Synthesis Centre, School of Nursing, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

    Rachel Warren & Donna Fitzpatrick-Lewis

  3. Negotiating Equity, School of Social Work, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

    Rachel Warren

  4. Department of Oncology, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

    Jonathan Sussman

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  1. Christina Sinding
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  2. Rachel Warren
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  4. Jonathan Sussman
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Correspondence to Christina Sinding.

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Sinding, C., Warren, R., Fitzpatrick-Lewis, D. et al. Research in cancer care disparities in countries with universal healthcare: mapping the field and its conceptual contours. Support Care Cancer 22, 3101–3120 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-014-2348-3

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