The global, regional, and national burden and quality of care index (QCI) of colorectal cancer; a global burden of disease systematic analysis 1990–2019

Background Colorectal cancer (CRC) is among the five most incident and lethal cancers in world and its burden varies between countries and sexes. We aimed to present a comprehensive measure called the quality of care index (QCI) to evaluate the inequity and healthcare quality of care regarding CRC by sex and location. Methods Data on the burden of CRC were extracted from the Global Burden of Disease study 2019. It was transformed to four ratios, including mortality-to-incidence, disability-adjusted life years (DALYs)-to-prevalence, prevalence-to-incidence, and years of life lost (YLLs)-to-years lived with disability (YLDs). Principal component analysis was implemented on the four ratios and the most influential component was considered as QCI with a score ranging from zero to 100, for which higher scores represented better quality of care. Gender Disparity Ratio (GDR) was calculated by dividing QCI for females by males. Results The global incidence and death numbers of CRC were 2,166,168 (95% uncertainty interval: 1,996,298–2,342,842) and 1,085,797 (1,002,795–1,149,679) in 2019, respectively. Globally, QCI and GDR values were 77.6 and 1.0 respectively in 2019. There was a positive association between the level of quality of care and socio-demographic index (SDI) quintiles. Region of the Americas and African Region had the highest and lowest QCI values, respectively (84.4 vs. 23.6). The QCI values started decreasing beyond the age of 75 in 2019 worldwide. Conclusion There is heterogeneity in QCI between SDI quintiles. More attention should be paid to people aged more than 75 years old because of the lower quality of care in this group.