For patients with breast cancer, geographic and social disparities are independent determinants of access to specialized surgeons. A eleven-year population-based multilevel analysis

Table 1 Characteristics of patients according to the surgeon class (high-volume or not)

	Total N = 3928		High-volume surgeon N = 2931		Others N = 997		P for heterogeneity
	N	%	N	%	N	%
Individual data
Age
< 50 years old	946	24.1	702	23.9	244	24.5	<0.001
50 to 74 years old	2438	62.1	1857	63.4	581	58.3
> 74 years old	544	13.8	372	12.7	172	17.2
Circumstances of diagnosis
Screening	1907	51.1	1501	53.2	406	44.8	<0.001
Not screening	1823	48.9	1323	48.8	500	55.2
Unknown	198
T Stage - size
T1	2875	75.7	2185	77.1	690	71.6	<0.001
T2	767	20.2	548	19.3	219	22.7
T3 and T4	156	4.1	101	3.6	55	5.7
Unknown	130
N Stage - nodes
N0	2591	68.2	1936	68.2	655	68.1	0.962
N1 and more	1211	31.8	904	31.8	307	31.9
Unknown	126
M Stage - metastasis
M0	3809	98.2	2843	98.3	966	98.0	0.500
M1	69	1.8	49	1.7	20	2.0
Unknown	50
At least one comorbidity
Yes	861	21.9	627	21.4	234	23.5	0.171
No	3067	78.1	2304	78.6	763	76.5	0.171
Time to the nearest reference cancer care centre
< 10 minutes	1153	29.3	917	31.3	236	23.7	<0.001
10 to 20 minutes	1049	26.7	831	28.4	218	21.8
20 to 35 minutes	599	15.3	438	14.9	161	16.2
> 35 minutes	1127	28.7	745	25.4	382	38.3
Aggregate data
Place of residence
Rural	1067	27.2	746	25.5	321	32.2	<0.001
Urban	2860	72.8	2184	74.5	676	67.8
Unknown	1
Townsend index
Quintile 1 (most affluent)	323	8.2	260	8.9	63	6.3	0.021
Quintile 2	557	14.2	432	14.8	125	12.5
Quintile 3	484	12.3	363	12.4	121	12.1
Quintile 4	722	18.4	531	18.1	191	19.2
Quintile 5 (most deprived)	1839	46.9	1342	45.8	497	49.9
Unknown	3

ISSN: 1471-2407