Premature Termination of Treatment among Adults Attending Treatment for Eating Disorders: A Critical Review

The article presents a critical review regarding the premature termination of eating disorder’s treatment among inpatients and outpatients, with the aim of identifying—emotional, psychodynamic and family-related aspects involved. The search strategy used the following MeSH terms combined by Boolean operators: “eating disorders” AND “treatment” OR “patient dropouts” OR “drop-out/dropouts” OR “attrition” OR “premature termination” AND “empirical study” OR “qualitative research”, for on Medline/PUBMED, PsycINFO and EMBASE databases. This article follows the PRISMA Guidelines. A total of 26 studies composed this review, of which 24 were original research articles, 1 was a review and 1 a theoretical article. Only two articles applied qualitative methods analyzing categories of content obtained by in-depth interviews, three combine quantitative and qualitative methods and other three present qualitative analyses while discussing quantitative studies. Further qualitative studies should be carried out to clarify meanings of dropout, premature termination of treatment, and attrition. Different expectations held by patients and by therapeutic teams, and the interpersonal difficulties of these types of patients, stand out as difficulties in constructing “therapeutic alliances”, with impacts on dropout, premature termination and attrition rates.

Acceptance on colorectal cancer screening upper age limit in South Korea

BACKGROUND The Korea National Cancer Screening Program currently provides screening for colorectal cancer(CRC)for adults older than 50 years with no upper age limit.In general,people are likely to only pay attention to the benefits of cancer screening and to neglect its risks.Most consider the benefits of cancer screening as being far greater than the risks and are unaware that any potential benefits and harms can vary with age.AIM To report acceptance of an upper age limit for CRC screening and factors associated therewith among cancer-free individuals in Korea.METHODS The present study analyzed data from the Korea National Cancer Screening Survey 2017,a nationally representative random sample of 4500 Korean individuals targeted for screening for the five most common types of cancer.A total of 1922 participants were included in the final analysis.The baseline characteristics of the study population are presented as unweighted numbers and weighted proportions.Both univariate and multivariate logistic regression models were developed to examine factors related with acceptance of an upper age limit for CRC screening;subgroup analysis was also applied.RESULTS About 80%(1554/1922)of the respondents agreed that CRC screening should not be offered for individuals older than 80 years.Specifically,those who had never been screened for CRC had the highest acceptance rate(91%).Overall,screening history for CRC[screened by both fecal occult blood test and colonoscopy,adjusted odds ratio(aOR)=0.33,95%CI:0.22-0.50]and other cancers(aOR=0.55,95%CI:0.34-0.87),as well as a family history of cancer(aOR=0.66,95%CI:0.50-0.87),were negatively associated with acceptance of an upper age limit for CRC screening.In contrast,metropolitan residents(aOR=1.86,95%CI:1.29-2.68)and people who exercised regularly(aOR=1.42,95%CI:1.07-1.89)were more likely to accept an upper age limit.After subgrouping,we found gender,marital status,and lifetime smoking history among never-screened individuals and residential region,family history of cancer,and physical activity among never-screened individuals to be associated with acceptance of an upper age limit.CONCLUSION This study describes acceptance of an upper age limit for CRC screening and factors associated with it,and provides perspectives that should be considered,in addition to scientific evidence,when developing population-based cancer screening policies and programs.