title: Automated uro-oncology data collection: the Cancer Research Uro-Oncology Database.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To develop a relational database (Cancer Research Uro-Oncology Database, CRUD) to enable automatic data collection on all urological malignancies within our region, as there is increasing emphasis on good data collection for surgical patients with cancer, and numerous overlapping systems that are amassing data on the same patients.
  
  
  METHODS
  Links have been established between pathological databases, multidisciplinary team data-collection systems and patient-survival monitoring facilities, providing accurate pathology, treatment and survival data on all of uro-oncology patients. We are also developing individual modules for the oncological surgeons within our unit that are compatible with the British Association of Urological Surgeons (Section of Oncology), and have plans to connect to the Medical and Clinical Oncology data systems in the future.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Pre-existing protocols for fresh tissue, plasma and urine collection have been incorporated within CRUD via a tissue-tracking system, to comply with the Human Tissue Act 2004, and link these samples to accurate clinical, pathological and survival data. Many research and audit projects have already used these data, including the construction of a 274-case tissue microarray for renal cell carcinoma, microRNA hybridization arrays and analysis of 900 nephrectomy cases from the past three decades.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our work over the past 3 years in Oxford has established numerous links with organizations collecting data on our uro-oncological patients, and we are now able to collect this excellent combined data on all of these patients, in an automated manner.
authors.affiliation: Department of Urology, Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals, Oxford, UK. philip.charlesworth@doctors.org.uk
authors.forename: Philip J S
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Charlesworth
authors.forename: Neviana
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Kilbey
authors.forename: Marian
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Taylor
authors.forename: Russell
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Leek
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Cranston
authors.forename: Gareth
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Turner
authors.forename: Jeremy
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Crew
authors.forename: Adrian
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Harris
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Protheroe
mesh_terms: D003625:Data Collection / Q000379:methods*; D016208:Databases, Factual; D006801:Humans; D016247:Information Storage and Retrieval; D008495:Medical Oncology; D016347:Medical Records Systems, Computerized; D014565:Urogenital Neoplasms; D014572:Urology