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Purpose: The health care industry has many stakeholders who seek relationships within government to ensure certain interests are considered in the legislative process. This study characterized the federal political contributions of US radiation oncologists (ROs).Methods and Materials: Public finance data from the Federal Election Commission (FEC) containing self-identified ROs' contributions to a federal candidate or committee were obtained from 2003 to 2018. Contribution recipients were classified as a political action committee (PAC) or a presidential, Senate, or House candidate. Political parties of recipients were based on FEC designations. For PACs, political parties of recipients were based on spending patterns to political parties in each 2-year election cycle or, when unavailable, overall spending patterns of greater than 50% to 1 political party, as detailed by the Center for Responsive Politics. Data were analyzed temporally, and Spearman's rho was used to assess trends.Results: From 2003 to 2018, the FEC reported a total of 31,646,000 federal political contributions. Exactly 4617 federal political contributions were made from 1021 unique self-identified ROs, totaling $3,350,747. The number of ROs making contributions ranged from 56 in 2005 to 600 in 2016 (mean, 289 ± 191.4 ROs yearly), with a mean annual contribution of $209,422. Of all RO dollars, 61.5% went to Democrats, 37.5% to Republicans, and 1.0% to third-party candidates. Most RO dollars (81.0%) went to PACs rather than candidates, with the majority of those PAC dollars (50.2%) directed toward the American Society for Radiation Oncology Political Action Committee. There was a positive annual trend in number of donors by year (ρ = 0.83, P < .0001) as well as RO contributions to the House (ρ = 0.58, P < .02), Senate (ρ = 0.58, P < .02), Democrats (ρ = 0.81, P < .001), Republicans (ρ = 0.66, P < .006), third-parties (ρ = 0.87, P < .001), PACs (ρ = 0.85, P < .0001), and overall (ρ = 0.8, P < .001). There was not a significant trend in contributions to presidential candidates (ρ = 0.71, P = .06).Conclusions: ROs' federal political contributions have significantly increased over the last decade and a half. This growth overwhelmingly represents contributions to specialty-focused PACs and both Democratic and Republican congressional candidates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Google is the most popular search engine in the United States, and patients are increasingly relying on online webpages to seek information about individual physicians. This study aims to characterize what patients find when they search for radiation oncologists online.Methods and Materials: The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Physician Comparable Downloadable File was used to identify all Medicare-participating radiation oncologists in the United States and Puerto Rico. Each radiation oncologist was characterized by medical school education, year of graduation, city of practice, gender, and affiliation with an academic institution. Using a custom Google-based search engine, up to the top 10 search results for each physician were extracted and categorized as relating to: (1) physician, hospital, or health care system; (2) third-party; (3) social media; (4) academic journal articles; or (5) other.Results: Among all health care providers in the United States within CMS, 4443 self-identified as being radiation oncologists and yielded 40,764 search results. Of those, 1161 (26.1%) and 3282 (73.9%) were classified as academic and nonacademic radiation oncologists, respectively. At least 1 search result was obtained for 4398 physicians (99.0%). Physician, hospital, and health care-controlled websites (16,006; 39.3%) and third-party websites (10,494; 25.7%) were the 2 most often observed domain types. Social media platforms accounted for 2729 (6.7%) hits, and peer-reviewed academic journal websites accounted for 1397 (3.4%) results. About 6.8% and 6.7% of the top 10 links were social media websites for academic and nonacademic radiation oncologists, respectively.Conclusions: Most radiation oncologists lack self-controlled online content when patients search within the first page of Google search results. With the strong presence of third-party websites and lack of social media, opportunities exist for radiation oncologists to increase their online presence to improve patient-provider communication and better the image of the overall field. We discuss strategies to improve online visibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Physicians encourage patients to be informed about their health care options, but much of the online health care-related resources can be beneficial only if patients are capable of comprehending it. This study's aim was to assess the readability level of online patient education resources for radiation oncology to conclude whether they meet the general public's health literacy needs as determined by the guidelines of the United States National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the American Medical Association (AMA).Methods: Radiation oncology-related internet-based patient education materials were downloaded from 5 major professional websites (American Society for Radiation Oncology, American Association of Physicists in Medicine, American Brachytherapy Society, RadiologyInfo.org, and Radiation Therapy Oncology Group). Additional patient education documents were downloaded by searching for key radiation oncology phrases using Google. A total of 135 articles were downloaded and assessed for their readability level using 10 quantitative readability scales that are widely accepted in the medical literature.Results: When all 10 assessment tools for readability were taken into account, the 135 online patient education articles were written at an average grade level of 13.7 ± 2.0. One hundred nine of the 135 articles (80.7%) required a high school graduate's comprehension level (12th-grade level or higher). Only 1 of the 135 articles (0.74%) met the AMA and NIH recommendations for patient education resources to be written between the third-grade and seventh-grade levels.Conclusion: Radiation oncology websites have patient education material written at an educational level above the NIH and AMA recommendations; as a result, average American patients may not be able to fully understand them. Rewriting radiation oncology patient education resources would likely contribute to the patients' understanding of their health and treatment options, making each physician-patient interaction more productive and efficient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Patient education materials (PEMs) empower patients to have an understanding of their health and treatment options. PEMs that currently exist in Radiation Oncology are available primarily as text heavy resources, or multiple-click web-based Internet resources, exceeding the national readability recommendation of a 6th grade reading level. A health literacy level appropriate PEM that simplifies the complexity of a cancer diagnosis and treatment options may be a reasonable option to facilitate patient-provider communication in Oncology. We are developing a multidisciplinary, health literacy appropriate thoracic oncology PEM at Rush University Medical Center (RUMC) in Chicago, IL, which serves a diverse patient population with varying health literacy levels. This new PEM, part of an ongoing study, aims to address the knowledge translation gap. The primary outcome is to assess the mean difference in patient satisfaction between control and study groups. The secondary outcome is to assess an interaction effect between health literacy and the overall effect of the PEM on patient satisfaction. This prospective randomized control trial with IRB approval is ongoing. The PEM was developed collaboration with media designers and the RUMC Patient Education Committee. Readability of the PEM was assessed with ten common readability assessment scales, represented through a mean score. All English or Spanish speaking adults scheduled for a new patient consult during Comprehensive Lung Clinic will be included. The control group will receive the standard of care (physician encounter without the PEM), while the intervention group will receive standard of care and the PEM. All patients will complete an anonymized validated survey that measures health literacy levels, sociodemographic factors, and satisfaction of the encounter. A cumulative anonymized health-care provider survey will gather descriptive data about health-care providers' experiences using the PEM. Descriptive statistics will characterize the control and study group. Patient satisfaction will be measured on a 5-point scale. A two-sample t-test with a one-sided alternative will measure the difference of mean score of patient satisfaction between the control and study group. We will apply interaction tests to determine the differential impact of health literacy on the correlation of the PEM and patient satisfaction. Multiple linear regression modeling will be done to determine the correlation of the PEM and patient satisfaction after adjusting for other socio-demographic variables. If received well, we will explore expanding this study to other treatment sites, with the overall goal of improving health literacy appropriate PEMs in Radiation Oncology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]