MCR MINI-UPDATE JULY 2014
Fellow Registrars,
Jeannette is at the NAACCR annual meeting in Ottawa this week and actively representing you on several committees.This is a busy time for the standard setters as all prepare for a transition in coming years to directly-assigned stage. We are working hard to keep you apprised of what we learn about this transition. See the attached CS Transition team newsletter #2 and items below.
Due Dates
All hospitals (>500 cases/yr) are due to report remaining 2013 cases by July 15, 2014.
Education
NAACCR Webinars – Get 3 CEU By Viewing Each Recorded Webinar. Request Access Now!
Check out our Education and Training page to find out how you can receive access to the recorded NAACCR Webinars.
July 10, 2014 – Topics in Survival Data
We have restored all links to the NAACCR webinar recordings. We apologize for any inconvenience during the time that they were unavailable.
Live Meetings - Visit our Education and Training page to listen to previous Live Meetings. They are available to listen to for one year after they are presented.
Have you started abstracting 2014 cases or getting close? Join us for this timely overview of the new grade coding instructions that have been integrated by our various standard setters for implementation in 2014. The grade data item will be reviewed and defined, various systems described and new changes identified. Don’t miss this opportunity to learn how the grade rules have been consolidated into one set of instructions that should make it easier for everyone.
July 9, 2014 – Standardized Grade Coding 2014
Presented by Deb Douglas
To register for any of our educational opportunities, call 1-866-240-8809 or contact Shari Ackerman at .
CancerCare Connect Education Workshops
These workshops on cancer-related topics are completely free of charge, however pre-registration is required to secure your place on the call. Registrants can listen in live over the phone or online as a webcast. To register go to http://www.cancercare.org/connect_workshops.
July 9, 2014 – Living with Gastrointestinal Stromal Tumors (GIST): Treatment
July 30, 2014 – Updates in the Treatment of HER2 Positive Breast Cancer: Part I of Living with Breast Cancer
MCR News
NPCR Audit
NPCR is in the process of auditing 200 cases from the MCR database. They look not only at text-to-code agreement in the incoming abstracts, but also at the codes MCR chose to use in the consolidated MCR case. We are in the midst of the audit response at the moment and have already discovered a few educational points. When the audit is complete, we will present a Live Meeting to share with you what we learned in the process and use the results to improve the quality of data in your registries and ours.
Conversion
We are on track to have Abstract Plus available to users soon and to upgrade Web Plus and CRS Plus in August. As stated before, please export your completed 2013 cases to us in v13 and then upgrade your system to v14 by the end of July so that you can report to us in v14 in August. If you convert to v14 before Web Plus is converted, just send a transmittal saying you are holding the cases until Web Plus is ready. If you try to upload a v14 file now you will get an error message saying it is not in NAACCR format because our system is not set up to read it. We will have more specific announcements in a blast email later in July to tell you the exact dates that Web Plus will be down for our conversion. Please do not transmit any cases diagnosed in 2014 until both your and our software have been converted.
Standard Setter News
CS Transition Team
A second newsletter was recently published to update us on the progress that is being made by the transition committees. It is attached to this email in case you did not receive it.
Their newsletter was followed by this announcement last week: “On June 17, the CS Transition Group agreed to continue collecting Site Specific Factors using the current NAACCR data layout and definitions at least through 2016. This approach will continue to use the programming and logic structure established in Collaborative Stage to collect those variables. The CS Transition Group felt that this would be the least disruptive way to proceed for 2016. The intention is to maintain the SSFs as they are until there is an opportunity to carefully evaluate the SSFs and to make decisions on how to structure the collection of these variables within the NAACCR record layout. In addition, any changes that will be needed to accommodate prognostic indicators in the AJCC 8th edition will be better known in 2016.
Excerpt from the SSF Data Structure Task Force Summary:
Option 3: Maintain current CS data structure and definitions. Standard setters would continue to specify requirements. Continue to collect required CS data items in their current CS locations. The existing CS DLL could continue to be used for site group determination, valid code definitions and documentation. Once the AJCC 8th edition is published, the structure will need to be altered to accommodate this change.”
SEER Educate TNM Training Modules being released
“SEER is pleased to announce an expansion of the free training and continuing education series in SEER*Educate. Over the next six weeks, fourteen TNM training modules will be released in SEER*Educate. Each of the following modules includes 10 case scenarios with answers and rationales to help registrars learn how to assign TNM in vendor software packages.
· Bladder
· Breast
· Cervix and Endometrium
· Colorectal
· Esophagus, GE Junction and Stomach
· Head and Neck
· Kidney
· Lung
· Lymphoma
· Melanoma
· Ovary
· Pancreas and Biliary
· Prostate
· Testis
The first three modules to be released on June 23rd will be breast, colon and prostate. From now through July 31st at least two additional modules will be released weekly. One of the best ways to learn cancer registry work is by doing cancer registry work. A primary goal of SEER*Educate is to provide access to free practical application exercises to learn how code and apply guidelines associated with various aspects of a registrar’s responsibility. SEER will be applying to the National Cancer Registrars Association (NCRA) for continuing education credits for this entire series. Sign up at SEER*Educate today by visiting https://educate.fhcrc.org/ and Learn by Doing!”
AJCC Website Resources
The AJCC website includes many resources that you may be interested in. In the section Quick Resources there are Cancer Staging Posters that can be downloaded and annotated. Under Cancer Staging Education, you’ll find articles about the TNM system as well as patient brochures and Staging Moments video case scenarios for cancer conferences. The same website is also the source for a wide array of webinars and videos on Collaborative Staging. https://cancerstaging.org/Pages/default.aspx
Registry to Research
CINA 2007-2011
“NAACCR is pleased to announce the Web release of the publication Cancer in North America (CINA): 2007-2011. Please visit www.naaccr.org and select Data and Publications for free access/downloading of the publication. This is the 24th annual release of this publication. This publication series is made possible by the combined and considerable efforts of regional, state, provincial and territorial NAACCR member registries across North America. The 2014 monograph includes data from 69 central population-based registries: 57 from the United States (50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and 5 metropolitan areas) and 12 from Canada (9 provinces and 3 territories).
Volume One includes combined data for the United States, for Canada and for all of North America. The information in Volume One includes leading cancer types by sex and, for the United States, by race and ethnicity.Age-adjusted cancer rates by cancer type, pediatric cancer data and cancer data by stage for selected cancers are also provided. Volume Two provides registry specific data while Volume Three, information on cancer mortality during 2007 through 2011, is pending the release of official U.S. mortality data.
NAACCR would like to acknowledge the work all the NAACCR member registries for their excellent work and their continued support of this extensive and voluntary collaboration. Note that there are other NAACCR products that are available for use in cancer research. These include CINA+ Online, NAACCR FastStats, CINA in SEER*Stat, CINA Plus in SEER*Stat, CINA Monograph data in SAS Data set and CINA Deluxe. More information on these additional resources is available at www.naaccr.org under Research.”
The relationship between area poverty rate and site-specific cancer incidence in the United States (CINA data)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cncr.28632/abstract
Demographics and Breast Cancer Subtype (NCDB data)
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10549-014-2976-9
Cancer Survivorship Statistics – 10 Key Facts (SEER & NCDB data)
http://www.cancer.org/research/acsresearchupdates/more/2014-cancer-survivorship-statistics-10-key-facts?utm_source=MasterBrand_Twitter&utm_medium=June_19&utm_content=10Facts&utm_campaign=JunePostsSocial
Correcting for Hysterectomy Changes Age and Race-Specific Incidence of Cervical Cancer (SEER data)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cncr.28548/abstract;jsessionid=250C0BEDF5EC6D48C061412CDACC5387.f03t02
Resources
Triple IT Therapy Alone for Pediatric ALL
http://jco.ascopubs.org/content/early/2014/05/12/JCO.2013.54.5020
Patient and Tumor Characteristics and BRAF or KRAS Mutations in Colon Cancer
http://jnci.oxfordjournals.org/content/106/7/dju106.abstract
10 Practice Changes I Will Make after Attending ASCO 2014
http://www.practiceupdate.com/ExpertOpinion/1043/1/1/?elsca1=emc_enews_expert-insight&elsca2=email&elsca3=practiceupdate_onc&elsca4=oncology&elsca5=newsletter&rid=NTU2MjE4MTE1NjYS1&lid=10332481
Unprecedented Overall Survival of Metastatic Melanoma
http://www.practiceupdate.com/News/5402/2/1/?elsca1=emc_enews_daily-digest&elsca2=email&elsca3=practiceupdate_onc&elsca4=oncology&elsca5=newsletter&rid=NTU2MjE4MTE1NjYS1&lid=10332481
Happy abstracting!
Nancy H. Rold, CTR
QA Unit Supervisor
Missouri Cancer Registry and Research Center
Collaborative Stage Transition Newsletter
June 16, 2014
Introduction
This is a communication update from organizations within the cancer surveillance community to share with their members and other constituents. It addresses the processes and ongoing efforts to coordinate and effectively transition from the Collaborative Staging v2 system to use of the AJCC staging standard with related biomarkers and prognostic factors. This is the second edition in the series of communication updates. Shortly after the decision was made to transition from Collaborative Stage, a CS Transition Group was formed as an information sharing and planning forum. This group brings together the four data collection agencies/organizations (Statistics Canada/Canadian Council of Cancer Registries, CDC/NPCR, NCI/SEER and CoC), the agency responsible for staging rules (AJCC), the cancer surveillance umbrella organization (NAACCR) and the organization representing cancer registry professionals (NCRA). The CS Transition Group provides a collaborative opportunity to identify the issues involved in the transition and to share the tasks involved in developing best practices for both the overall surveillance community and the individual agencies/organizations in addressing this change.
The agencies and organizations participating in this communication recognize that the transition away from CS is a major change and are committed to working with stakeholders to develop appropriate implementation plans and processes. This is a work in progress, and there are many questions that have yet to be fully addressed. As answers become available they will be shared and communicated to the surveillance community, and opportunities will be provided for members to identify issues and concerns.
There are a number of areas of confusion within the surveillance community that this communication will address. The initial change in 2016 for CDC and NCI registries will be focused on the transition to directly assigned AJCC stage, but will not eliminate all CS variables. In particular most of the Site Specific Factors (SSFs) will continue to be required as they are a) either a critical component of stage assignment or b) are essential to understanding the cancer (predictive or prognostic factors). Thus the initial transition will be focused on assignment of T, N, M, and the AJCC stage group. As the coordinating bodies, we will clarify which additional variables and which SSFs will continue to be required, but our intent is to carefully evaluate which are essential and which are feasible to be collected by the registrar. The methods/studies and processes that will be used to make these determinations are described below. Each participating entity is performing specific and coordinated tasks related to assessing the needs for the transition, determining the impact of the transition and coordinating the logistical components for implementing the changes.
The CS Transition Group and the Uniform Data Standards Committee held a joint meeting via conference call to discuss the activities of the CS Transition Group and the existing plans to make decisions regarding data variables based on NAACCR’s deadlines for 2016 changes. There was considerable discussion about issues that need to be addressed in preparation for the collection of AJCC staging. In summary, the primary changes in data collection will be related to the CSv2 variables related to staging. A process has been developed for submitting proposed changes and for review of the programmatic and technical implications of these proposed changes.
The specific activities of each of the partner organizations are described in the section below with the organization and task leader responsible for that activity.
Agency Updates
The following is a collection of activity summaries written by the respective agency/organization in follow up to the original newsletter to provide a current status of the activities of each partner organization. We intend to continue providing regular updates on these activities. In some cases you will note that agencies are working independently on specific issues, while in other cases shared project work is underway.
We have identified several common questions and provided responses from NCI/SEER, CDC/NPCR and the COC at the end of the document. We have included the original questions and answers as well as new questions. The latter are highlighted in italics.
Current and planned activities by the partner organization in relation to the CS Transition:
A. AJCC
Update
Education on AJCC
The American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) will provide ongoing education around AJCC TNM Staging to support the transition to directly assigned AJCC stage. The AJCC currently provides an array of educational offerings for free through its website, cancerstaging.org. The educational resources that are available on the website include the Summary of Changes, the Cancer Staging Posters, Staging Moments PowerPoints and Staging Moments as embedded videos. The AJCC also has 13 recorded webinars available for free on the Commpartners Education Portal Page at http://eo2.commpartners.com/users/acsnew/search.php.
In addition to these existing educational resources on AJCC Staging, the AJCC will develop new educational offerings through the support of the CDC cooperative agreement. The AJCC output will include the following: