3 RESULTS
Nineteen (19) service users (aged from 21 to 71 years) and seventeen (17) practitioners (aged from 33 to 55 years) were interviewed between September 2014 and September 2015. Two (2) service users had a previous diagnosis of cancer, and all the other service user participants had relatives or friends who had a previous diagnosis of cancer, which may have motivated them to participate in the study. Once they had agreed to take part, no participants dropped out of the study. The demographic characteristics of interviewees are shown in table 1.
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The overarching themes identified barriers and facilitators to implementing the tool. The barriers were: the need for additional consultation time; unnecessary worry relating to cancer investigations; over-referral that could over-burden services; practitioner scepticism; conflict with existing guidelines; certain symptoms needing referral at any risk; the need to train practitioners on use of the tool; the need to establish effectiveness of the tool against existing practice before introducing it into practice; and the need to integrate the tool into general practice systems. These are discussed in more detail below.