Trends in chemotherapy-related treatment of late-stage colon and rectal cancer.

6604 Background: The appropriate intensity of treatment for patients with advanced incurable cancer remains uncertain. Our study examines trends in population-based treatment following diagnosis for metastatic colon and rectal cancer in elderly adults. Methods: We used the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results – Medicare database to identify persons aged 65 and older who were diagnosed with distant stage colon (N=12156) and rectal cancer (N=3071) between 2000 and 2007. We assessed treatment patterns over the year after diagnosis with a focus on chemotherapy and related services. For each year, we report the percent of patients receiving chemotherapy, hematopoietic growth factors, and antiemetics/premedication. For those patients who received chemotherapy, we estimated, by year, the median number of days from the first to the last chemotherapy claim. Results: From 2000 to 2007, the percent of patients receiving chemotherapy increased from 39.6% to 44.4% for colon patients and from 46.6% to 59.2% for ...