Evaluation and revision of checklists for screening facilities and municipal governmental programs for gastric cancer and colorectal cancer screening in Japan.
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the appropriateness of current checklists created by a governmental committee to assess screening programs run by municipal governments and service provider facilities for gastric and colorectal cancer, and to accumulate expert opinions to provide insights aimed at the next revision.


METHODS
We convened an expert panel that consisted of physicians nominated by regional offices of the Japanese Society for Gastrointestinal Cancer Screening and radiology technicians nominated by the technician chapter of the society. The panel rated the appropriateness of each checklist item on a scale of 1-9 (1, extremely inappropriate; 9, extremely appropriate) twice, between which they had a face-to-face discussion meeting. During the process they were allowed to propose modifications and additions to the items.


RESULTS
In the first round of rating, the panelists rated all 57 and 56 checklists items for gastric and colorectal cancer, respectively, as appropriate based on an acceptance rule determined a priori. During the process of the face-to-face discussion, however, the panel proposed modifications to 23 (40%) and 22 (39%) items, respectively, and the addition of 27 new items each. After integrating overlapping items and rating again for appropriateness, 66 and 64 items, respectively, were accepted as the revised checklist set.


CONCLUSIONS
The expert panel considered current checklists for colorectal and gastric cancer-screening programs and facilities to be suitable. Their proposals for a new set of checklist items will help further improve the checklists.
Department of Public Health/Health Policy, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.
Takahiro
T
Higashi
Ryoko
R
Machii
Ayako
A
Aoki
Chisato
C
Hamashima
Hiroshi
H
Saito
D002173:Cancer Care Facilities / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D057189:Checklist; D015179:Colorectal Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis*; D055088:Early Detection of Cancer / Q000592:standards*; D006078:Government Programs / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D013274:Stomach Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis*