Skip to main content
NCBI home page
Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health logoLink to Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health
. 1995 Aug;49(4):426–430. doi: 10.1136/jech.49.4.426

Estimating completeness of cancer registration: an empirical evaluation of the two source capture-recapture approach in Germany.

H Brenner 1, C Stegmaier 1, H Ziegler 1
PMCID: PMC1060133  PMID: 7650468

Abstract

STUDY OBJECTIVE--In recent years, capture-recapture methods have become increasingly popular in estimating completeness of disease registries. This study aimed to assess the performance of the two source capture-recapture method in estimating the completeness of cancer registration. DESIGN--The study was conducted in the population based cancer registry of Saarland, Germany, for which there are three main sources of notifications: reports by clinicians and pathologists, and death certificates. For groups of cases notified by one of the three sources, known completeness of registration by the other two sources was compared with the corresponding two source capture-recapture estimates. PATIENTS--A total of 16,020 patients notified to the cancer registry in 1970, 1975, 1980, and 1985 were included in the analysis. MAIN RESULTS--There was a tendency towards underestimation of completeness of notifications from pathologists and death certificates for patients notified by clinicians which was essentially confined to the older age groups. In contrast, capture-recapture methods tended to overestimate completeness of notifications from clinicians and death certificates for patients notified by pathologists. This overestimation was observed consistently in all age groups and for all of the most common cancer sites. Nevertheless, deviations of estimated completeness from known completeness were generally small or moderate. Agreement between estimated and known completeness was closest for patients notified by death certificates, although completeness was somewhat underestimated in patients above age 75. The observed patterns are in agreement with knowledge on clinical aspects and clinical management of cancer patients and with the circumstances of cancer registration in Saarland. CONCLUSIONS--Careful application of capture-recapture methods may provide an alternative to traditional approaches for estimating completeness of cancer registration.

Full text

PDF
426

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Cochi S. L., Edmonds L. E., Dyer K., Greaves W. L., Marks J. S., Rovira E. Z., Preblud S. R., Orenstein W. A. Congenital rubella syndrome in the United States, 1970-1985. On the verge of elimination. Am J Epidemiol. 1989 Feb;129(2):349–361. doi: 10.1093/oxfordjournals.aje.a115138. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Coleman M. P., Démaret E. Cancer registration in the European community. Int J Cancer. 1988 Sep 15;42(3):339–345. doi: 10.1002/ijc.2910420306. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Hilsenbeck S. G., Kurucz C., Duncan R. C. Estimation of completeness and adjustment of age-specific and age-standardized incidence rates. Biometrics. 1992 Dec;48(4):1249–1262. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Hook E. B., Regal R. R. Capture-recapture methods. Lancet. 1992 Mar 21;339(8795):742–742. doi: 10.1016/0140-6736(92)90639-k. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. Hook E. B., Regal R. R. Validity of Bernoulli census, log-linear, and truncated binomial models for correcting for underestimates in prevalence studies. Am J Epidemiol. 1982 Jul;116(1):168–176. doi: 10.1093/oxfordjournals.aje.a113391. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  6. LaPorte R. E., McCarty D. J., Tull E. S., Tajima N. Counting birds, bees, and NCDs. Lancet. 1992 Feb 22;339(8791):494–495. doi: 10.1016/0140-6736(92)91103-f. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. LaPorte R. E., Tull E. S., McCarty D. Monitoring the incidence of myocardial infarctions: applications of capture-mark-recapture technology. Int J Epidemiol. 1992 Apr;21(2):258–262. doi: 10.1093/ije/21.2.258. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  8. McCarty D. J., Tull E. S., Moy C. S., Kwoh C. K., LaPorte R. E. Ascertainment corrected rates: applications of capture-recapture methods. Int J Epidemiol. 1993 Jun;22(3):559–565. doi: 10.1093/ije/22.3.559. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  9. Robles S. C., Marrett L. D., Clarke E. A., Risch H. A. An application of capture-recapture methods to the estimation of completeness of cancer registration. J Clin Epidemiol. 1988;41(5):495–501. doi: 10.1016/0895-4356(88)90052-2. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  10. Shanmugaratnam K. Availability and completeness of cancer registration worldwide. Recent Results Cancer Res. 1989;114:28–33. doi: 10.1007/978-3-642-83651-0_3. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  11. Storm H. H. Completeness of cancer registration in Denmark 1943-1966 and efficacy of record linkage procedures. Int J Epidemiol. 1988 Mar;17(1):44–49. doi: 10.1093/ije/17.1.44. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  12. Wittes J. T., Colton T., Sidel V. W. Capture-recapture methods for assessing the completeness of case ascertainment when using multiple information sources. J Chronic Dis. 1974 Feb;27(1):25–36. doi: 10.1016/0021-9681(74)90005-8. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  13. Wittes J., Sidel V. W. A generalization of the simple capture-recapture model with applications to epidemiological research. J Chronic Dis. 1968 Aug;21(5):287–301. doi: 10.1016/0021-9681(68)90038-6. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health are provided here courtesy of BMJ Publishing Group

RESOURCES