Background: The importance of exercise and diet to enhance outcomes of people across the cancer continuum is well known; however, referrals to exercise and diet specialists are infrequent. Exercise and diet referrals are often driven by patients who know to ask, or health professionals who are aware of diet and exercise importance, meaning that patients don't receive equitable opportunity for referral. Assessment-based triage pathways (needs-analysis assessment), to prioritise those likely to benefit most from exercise and diet referrals, could reduce this inequity. However, best practice for needs-assessment and triage is unknown. To learn from current practice within health services, this study explores the landscape of needs-analysis assessments that lead to targeted exercise and diet referrals within Australian oncology practices, and provider recommendations for improvement.

Methods: Oncology medical and allied health professionals actively delivering cancer services within Australian private or public health services will be included (target sample size n = 100). The survey will include questions regarding current health service practices in exercise and diet needs-analysis (e.g., if, when and how assessment is conducted, and using what tools), along with suggested recommendations for improvement (e.g., time, timing). Quantitative responses will be descriptively summarised, with qualitative responses coded and analysed thematically.

Results: Recruitment and data collection is on-going; preliminary results of the survey will be presented.

Conclusions: This study will summarise current exercise and diet needs-analysis practices among Australian oncology services, including the number of services that have an active triage pathway, and what needs-analysis assessments are included in these contexts. By collating this information and provider-informed recommendations for improvement, the final step is to adapt and develop a needs-analysis tool for national utility. Ultimately, this work will enable us to better identify and target people most likely to benefit from exercise and diet referrals and interventions, to enhance service delivery and equity.