Primary Health Care Physician’s Role in Return to Work after Cancer: A Systematic Review

Abstract

Cancer is considered one of the most debilitating diseases as it affects all aspects of patients' life. One of the most neglected aspects is the ability to return to work during or after cancer treatment. General practitioners were considered the most common visited physicians after cancer treatment. However, their role in this critical problem to cancer patients is not well established. That is why we have done this review to investigate the role of general practitioners and primary health care in cancer care and how it should be reinforced. Six databases were searched using specific search terms. We included any study that assessed the role of general practitioners to help cancer patients return to work. In addition, we included studies that assessed the difficulties towards the integration of general physicians into the plan of care of cancer patients. The studies were assessed for the quality of evidence using the NIH quality assessment tool before being included for the review. Seven studies fulfilled our inclusion criteria and had passed the quality assessment to be included for the qualitative evidence synthesis. Based on these studies, the patients reported the lack of support from the general practitioners in the primary health care, and they found the attitude of the general practitioners not encouraging to ask for support from them. For general practitioners, they acknowledged their lack of support towards cancer patients and they needed more resources so they can counsel the patient regarding their work environment. General practitioners lacked the necessary knowledge and resources required to help patients to get back to their workplace. More plans are required to help them understand the problems of cancer survivors so they can counsel them properly.