Does access to quality accreditation improve health? – Patient-level evidence from German cancer care.

This retrospective cohort study assessed the impact of local access to accredited cancer care centers in Germany on survival outcomes for eight cancer types. It analyzed 861,508 patients from a registry covering 5.3 million cases between 1999 and 2018.

Key findings include:

• Treatment in accredited centers significantly reduced mortality risk for breast, colon, and prostate cancers (hazard ratios 0.87–0.96).
• Five-year survival probabilities improved by 1.8 to 7.3 percentage points for five cancer types, with variations according to disease severity.
• Access to accredited care in neighboring districts provided positive spillover survival benefits.

These findings highlight accreditation as an effective strategy to improve cancer outcomes and support the further expansion of such programs while minimizing patient travel burden.