Dashboards are effective tools to communicate data, but they can also be misleading or confusing if the wrong metrics are used. So, how do you choose the right metrics or indicators?
Here is a short article with 6 steps to help you get started. Click HERE.
How did you find your calling in life? Florence Nightingale knew at a very young age she was being called as a nurse. Her family was not supportive and felt it to be beneath her station in life as a debutante in a wealthy and privileged society. She volunteered to work in a hospital to explore her dream. But her family bullied and punished her every step of the way. Struggling to make the most important decision of her life, she wrote to Dr. Samuel G. Howe asking for advice. He responded by saying, “…if you have a vocation for that way of life, act up to your inspiration and you will find there is never anything unbecoming or unladylike in doing your duty for the good of others. Choose, go on with it, wherever it may lead you.”
#CTR #cancerregistry #cancerregistrar #cancer #purpose #inspiration
Cancer and cardiovascular disease are the two most common causes of death. The association between cardiotoxicity and cancer treatment has been known for some time. But, cardio-oncology as a medical subspecialty is fairly new. Cancer Registrars should understand the risks, short- and long-term side effects if they are to accurately review and document the patient’s continuum of care. To get you started here is a short 3.5 minute video.
Can cancer patients skip conventional chemotherapy and radiation therapy treatments and undergo T-cell therapy instead? New research conducted by UCLA, Stanford and others shows promise. Watch this video below.
One of the biggest challenges faced with conducting cancer prevention events is establishing a knowledge base and understanding with the participants. To create a healthier population, or to educate the community in such a way that they take a proactive step to living a healthier life, it is important to develop common-sense strategies that the community understands. It’s important to teach them about sun exposure and skin cancer risk, but equally important to teach them about other risk reduction strategies, such as exercise for busy moms or simple, cost effective food preparation.
There are no guidelines or limitations to the type of strategies you can develop. What is important is that you understand your communities unique needs and lifestyle norms so you can tailor the strategy to what is happening right where you live. Some research notes that lack of “real-world” resources or education that is focused on the population are barriers to delivering an effective program.
In this article methods to create population-specific strategies are discussed. Share this with your cancer committee, community outreach coordinators or other individuals who will help you plan your events.
To read the Oncology Nursing Society (ONS) article click here.
The number of cancer survivors is growing in the USA as a result of combined effects of a growing and aging population as well as advances in early detection and treatment. The American Cancer Society collaborates with the National Cancer Institute to estimate cancer prevalence in the US for the most common cancers. In the 2022 report statistics on contemporary treatment patterns and survival as well as issues related to survivorship and the COVID-19 pandemic are discussed. Then, for the first time, treatment data by race/ethnicity for a selected set of cancers (female breast, colon, rectum, lung and uterus) are also presented.
Information in this report can be very useful for cancer registrars and administrators for statistical comparison or to understand the unique characteristics of the population in your region.
Download the report here and share with your colleagues!
8/22/2022 – NAACCR has released the 2023 updates to the ICD-O-3 histology and behavior codes. All Registrars, regardless of which type of facility, should become familiarw with the proposed changes and guidelines and coordinate with your software vendor updates to their software and edits metafiles.
To download the files (at no charge), click here ICD O 3 Coding Updates – NAACCR. Updates are available in PDF and Excel file formats. Code lists are available in numeric and alpha tables. Also available is an annotated histology list with descriptions. Be sure to read the Coding Guidelines document for the summary of changes and how updates will be implemented and the rationale for doing so.
Cervical cancer screening helps to detect early disease and saves lives! And yet, according to the CDC, over 13,000 women are diagnosed each year and over 4,000 will die from their disease. About half the women who are diagnosed with cervical cancer never received screening.
The CDC launched a study to look into cervical cancer screening. Cancer Registries in Michigan, New Jersey and Louisiana participated in the study to identify women who were 21 years of age or older and diagnosed with cervical cancer. Patients were surveyed about whether they were screened or not, and if not, the reasons why. Household income, health insurance, race and ethnicity were also collected.
The study determined that of the women who participated, over 60% of them had not undergone screening for early detection. At the top of the list of reasons were that the women were not aware of the risk factors, understand test procedures or results, or did not have insurance benefits to pay for testing.
The study analysis included a lot of other valuable information as well that can be used by cancer centers and programs to develop cervical cancer screening and community outreach programs. To read the entire article on the CDC website, click here.
There is no shortage on synonymous terminology in the medical record. Knowing whether to accession a case, or how to code the extent of disease, in a case that is laced with synonymous or ambiguous terms can be daunting to say the least! Fortunately, there are standard-setting agencies guidelines to help the Cancer Registrar make the right determination and assign proper codes to the case abstract.
Recently a query was posted to the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) SINQ inquiry system (SINQ #20210036) that caught our eye. Paraphrased, the question was: are lymphovascular invasion and lymphovascular space invasion the same term or do they describe something different? Great question!
So we went to our favorite pathology dictionary and looked it up. There we learned that lymphovascular invasion, or LVI, is the term given to the movement of cancer cells into either a blood or lymphatic vessel. Once the cancer cells make their move they have the ability to spread to other parts of the body. Cancer Registrars know this movement to another part of the body to be called metastasis.
Lymphovascular invasion is an important prognostic indicator that pathologists may see in the tissue sample. Pathology reports stating the specimen is positive for lymphovascular invasion mean that it was seen in the tissue examined and conversely, if stated as being negative it means it was not seen.
You will be happy to know that according to SEER, the two terms, lymphovascular invasion or lymphovascular space invasion are synonmous with one another.
Now, just in case you’re interested in what the pathologist sees when he/she finds lymphovascular invasion, we found an example from specimen slide on the UCDavis Department of Pathology website. In the graphic below you can clearly see the malignant cells (small dark circles or dots) spilling out of the lymphatic space (white) and into the surrounding tissue.
So now you know the difference between the two terms!
There are over 300 different types of cancer. A cancer registrar is specially trained in how to correctly gather the data from the medical record and to code and classify it for research and strategic planning. From time to time they will come across a type of cancer they may not be as familiar with as compared to cancers like lung, colon, prostate, breast, etc. Having a resource like this one published by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) is very helpful.