History and Background
The 2018 Surveillance, Treatment, Access, and Research (STAR) Act required data collection and early reporting for pediatric, adolescent and young adult cancers ages 0 through 29 years. Rhode Island is 1 of 4 states to work with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on this project. Rhode Island enacted a mandate requiring all cancer incidences be reported to the Rhode Island Central Registry (RICR) within 30 to 45 days of the date of first contact with a physician. To improve this reporting process, certified cancer registrars (ODS-Cs) working on the STAR Project developed a data dictionary that could be used by facilities when submitting reports to RICR (Table 1).
Table 1.
Data Dictionary for the 2018 Surveillance, Treatment, Access, and Research (STAR) Act Project
Objective
The study objective was to develop a standardized template of minimally required data fields to streamline the process and improve the timeliness of monthly reports submitted to RICR.
Results
When the template was introduced in May 2022, 56% of all facilities reporting cancer cases in the 0–29-year age group used the template. By December 2022, 89% of facilities were using the template (Figures 1 and 2).
Figure 1.
Facility Adoption Rate, April–December 2022
Figure 2.
Key Data Item Completeness
Methods
The following methods were implemented:
Create a standardized template containing minimum data variables that were selected from information gathered from widely used rapid case reporting systems.
Introduce all facilities reporting of pediatric, adolescent, and young adult cancer cases to the template.
Offer certificates of participation to encourage template adoption over a 6-month period.
Evaluate the adoption rate of the data dictionary template and discuss the barriers to implementation.
Conclusions
Over a 6-month period, there was a 33% increase in the number of facilities using the template. This demonstrates that reporting facilities can successfully implement use of a new template without additional burden on the part of the hospital registry. Future studies will evaluate how usage of this new template may impact reporting timeliness and data quality.
Footnotes
This content was originally presented as a poster at the North American Association of Central Cancer Registries (NAACCR) 2023 Annual Conference, New Orleans, Louisiana, June 2023.
For more information on the STAR Project or the research on this abstract contact STAR@Tanaq.com.
The findings and conclusions are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position of Tanaq Support Services, Peer-Partners, or the Rhode Island Department of Health.