This session’s purpose is to share information about activities of the cancer registry community to develop health information technology standards for interoperability between healthcare systems and central cancer registries. The first presentation provides an overview of activities to develop standard formats for anatomic pathology and clinic/physician office reporting to cancer registries. The other presentations discuss activities by two state cancer registries to implement electronic clinic/physician office reporting using the developed standard.

Population-based central cancer registries (CCRs) maintain high quality demographic, tumor and treatment data for all cancer patients in their state or catchment area.  CCRs have traditionally relied on hospital registries for reporting of cancer incidence cases. As more cases are diagnosed and treated outside hospital settings, the gap in reporting is increasing. The current national focus on meaningful use provides an incentive for physician offices to use certified electronic health records (EHRs) and offers CCRs the opportunity to obtain needed data more rapidly and less expensively. 

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) National Program of Cancer Registries (NPCR) will provide an overview of activities to develop standard formats for anatomic pathology and clinic/physician office reporting to cancer registries using existing Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise constructs.

Kentucky Cancer Registry will present efforts to establish standardized electronic reporting from medical and radiation oncology practices throughout Kentucky, in partnership with CDC, the Kentucky Health Information Exchange (KHIE), and the Kentucky Regional Extension Center.  Assessing the capacity of oncology electronic medical record (EMR) vendors to implement modern standard interfaces is an important aspect of this effort. Efforts to date will be presented, including progress towards integration with the KHIE, reception of the project by oncology practices, vendor feedback, and standards development.

Missouri Cancer Registry and Research Center (MCR-ARC) will discuss their project to improve completeness of reporting to MCR by identifying primary care and specialty physician offices where electronic reporting from EHRs to the CCR can be implemented. MCR, in collaboration with the Missouri Health Information Technology (HIT) Assistance Center (AC), will identify and recruit providers and EHR vendors; collaborate with HIT AC staff, providers and EHR vendors to implement electronic reporting to MCR; complete an initial validation of content and format of data received; and conduct an evaluation of the project.