RESUMO
Older adults with cancer often present with distinct complexities that complicate their care, yet the language used to discuss their management at multidisciplinary cancer conferences (MCCs) remains poorly understood. A mixed methods study was conducted at a tertiary cancer centre in Toronto, Canada, where MCCs spanning five tumour sites were attended over six months. For presentations pertaining to a patient aged 75 or older, a standardized data collection form was used to record their demographic, cancer-related, and non-cancer-related information, as well as the presenter's specialty and training level. Descriptive statistics and thematic analysis were employed to explore MCC depictions of older patients (n = 75). Frailty status was explicitly mentioned in 20.0% of presentations, but discussions more frequently referenced comorbidity burden (50.7%), age (33.3%), and projected treatment tolerance (30.7%) as surrogate measures. None of the presentations included mentions of formal geriatric assessment (GA) or validated frailty tools; instead, presenters tended to feature select GA domains and subjective descriptions of appearance ("looks to be fit") or overall health ("relatively healthy"). In general, MCCs appeared to rely on age-focused language that may perpetuate ageism. Further work is needed to investigate how frailty and geriatric considerations can be objectively incorporated into discussions in geriatric oncology.
