By Kathleen Rathvon, CTR North Puget Cancer Center United General Hospital 2000 Hospital Dr Sedro Woolley, WA 98284 (360) 856-7512
Cancer is a reportable disease. Facilities diagnosing or treating
cancer are required by law to report those cases to the State Registry
and ultimately to the CDC. United General Hospital has an Approved
Community Hospital Cancer Program through the American College of
Surgeons (ACOS) Commission on Cancer (CoC). Being an approved program
means we also report to the National Cancer Data Base (NCDB). NCDB is a
joint venture between the CoC and the American Cancer Society (ACS).
Cancer registries collect data on occurrence of cancer (incidence),
types of cancer (site and histology), disease spread at diagnosis
(stage), treatment given and outcomes / survival. Collecting and
analyzing this data results in improved methods of cancer diagnosis,
treatment and ultimately survival.
The Cancer Registry at United General currently contains more than
9,000 patients. In 2007, 242 new incidences were entered into the
Registry. Our top 5 sites were Breast, Lung, Colorectal, Hematopoietic
(bone marrow) and Prostate.
Table 7 has a more in-depth review of our
site distribution.
By Kathleen Rathvon, CTR
