NCI and ASCO CancerLinQ collaboration to advance quality of cancer care and surveillance.

Abstract

e18317 Background: The National Cancer Institute (NCI) Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Program curates population-based cancer data representing 34% of the US population. CancerLinQ is an ASCO initiative that collects and analyzes electronic health record (EHR) data to give oncologists opportunities to improve the quality of patient care. With the shared goal of understanding care delivery, NCI SEER and CancerLinQ launched a pilot linkage. Purpose: Establish data exchange between registries and oncology practices to a) provide clinicians with SEER data to more effectively evaluate care within their practices, and b) enhance ability of SEER registries to capture cancer-related data and facilitate compliance of legally mandated public health reporting requirements while supporting metrics for quality reporting to providers. Methods: The SEER Iowa Cancer Registry is developing bidirectional linkages with CancerLinQ practices. The initial pilot in Iowa establishes connectivity and a data pipeline to capture discrete data elements in EHRs. The linkage methods are securely conducted by IMS, an honest broker for the Registry and ASCO. Patterns of care will be evaluated in the matched patient population. Analysis of shared data elements will provide comparative validation of data captured electronically (EHR) and manually (abstraction). Enhancing the patient care quality through efficient utilization of shared data was paramount when selecting treatment-related Quality Oncology Practice Initiative (QOPI) measures for calculation focusing on breast (QPP 449, QPP 450) and prostate cancer (QPP 102, QPP 104). Results: Publicly available SEER data for cohort evaluation is available to providers via SEERLinQ. The two-way exchange data pipeline complies with reporting requirements. Validation of shared data elements, statistics for matched patients, improved data completeness measures, and automated calculation of QOPI measures will be demonstrated. Conclusions: This collaboration builds an initial foundation of curated Registry-EHR linked data to automate cancer reporting to lower the physician burden, improve SEER evaluation of clinical care patterns, and enhance patient care quality.