Current status of cancer registration in the Federal Republic of Germany and prospects for further development.
There is a network of hospital registries at cancer centers in the Federal Republic of Germany which, by 1985, had registered about 200,000 patients. Although the hospital registries do not have a strict population basis, the data obtained could be used for analytic epidemiological studies. The hospital registries are hindered from doing their own epidemiological cancer research mainly by their shortage of personnel. A particular organization - a pediatric cancer registry in Mainz - has registered about 95% of all childhood neoplasias and leukemias since 1980. Of the population-based registries of the Saarland, Hamburg, and Münster, only the Saarland Cancer Registry can at present provide actual incidence rates. In the three federal states of Saarland, Hamburg, and North Rhine-Westphalia, laws concerning cancer registries were enacted with different regulations regarding registration. In Hamburg and North Rhine-Westphalia the patient has to approve forwarding of his personal data to the registry. Exceptions are permitted under special conditions. Pathology institutes cannot report directly. In the Saarland, research institutes are not allowed to be given personal data. The position of the epidemiological cancer registries is actually threatened by the official application of restrictive data-protection laws.
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Pathologisches Institut der Universität des Saarlandes, Homburg/Saar, FRG.
D005260:Female; D005544:Forecasting; D005860:Germany, West; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000401:mortality; D012042:Registries