title: Impact of automated data collection from urology offices: improving incidence and treatment reporting in urologic cancers.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Urologic cancers represent a substantial proportion of the total cancer burden, yet the true burden of these cancers is unknown due to gaps in current cancer surveillance systems. Prostate and bladder cancers in particular may be underreported due to increased availability of outpatient care. Thus, there is a critical need to develop systems to completely and accurately capture longitudinal data to understand the true patterns of care and outcomes for these cancers.
  
  
  METHODS
  We determined the accuracy and impact of automated software to capture and process billing data to supplement reporting of cancers diagnosed and treated in a large community urology practice. From these data, we estimated numbers of unreported cancers for an actively reporting and for a non-reporting practice and the associated impact for a central cancer registry.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The software automatically processed billing data representing 26,133 visits for 15,495 patients in the 3.5-month study period. Of these, 2,275 patients had a cancer diagnosis and 87.2% of these matched with a central registry case. The estimated annual number of prostate and bladder cancers remaining unreported from this practice was 158. If the practice were not actively reporting, the unreported cases were estimated at 1,111, representing an increase of 12% to the registry. Treatments added from billing varied by treatment type with the largest proportion of added treatments for biologic response modifiers (BRMs) (127%-166%) and chemotherapy (22%).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Automated processing of billing data from community urology practices offers an opportunity to enhance capture of missing prostate and bladder cancer surveillance data with minimal effort to a urology practice.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Broader implementation of automated reporting could have a major impact nationally considering the more than 12,000 practicing urologists listed as members of the American Urological Association.
authors.affiliation: Massey Cancer Center, Department of Internal Medicine, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA 23298-0306, USA. lpenbert@vcu.edu
authors.forename: Lynne T
authors.initials: LT
authors.lastname: Penberthy
authors.forename: Donna
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: McClish
authors.forename: Pamela
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Agovino
mesh_terms: D001331:Automation; D003625:Data Collection / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D010350:Patient Credit and Collection / Q000458:organization & administration; D011159:Population Surveillance; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000628:therapy; D012042:Registries; D012984:Software; D001749:Urinary Bladder Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000628:therapy; D014571:Urologic Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000628:therapy*