Cancer data collection: blunt instruments get some honing

Abstract

South Africa’s pathology laboratory-based cancer registry is seven years out of date and conclusions based on its data are a decade old, making an appropriate and properly tailored strategic national response to this highly prevalent disease extremely difficult.
This emerged at a ‘Voice of Cancer’ survivor forum attended by all but one of the major cancer NGOs, government officials and survivors at the Civic Centre in Cape Town last month. According to the National Cancer Registry (NCR), run by the National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS), South African men have a lifetime risk of 1 in 6 of developing cancer and women a 1 in 8 lifetime risk. The time, money and resources needed for hospital and population-based registries have proven almost insurmountable, except in the Eastern Cape, where a bold attempt by the Medical Research Council (MRC) is being hampered by dismal patient record-keeping.