Abstract
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Background
Keywords
Findings
Authors
What is already known on this subject?
What does this study add?
Background
Linking cancer registry and administrative data can reveal health care use patterns among cancer patients. The Canadian Cancer Registry (CCR) contains personal health insurance numbers (HINs) that facilitate linkage to hospitalization information in the Discharge Abstract Database (DAD).
Data and methods
Valid HINs, captured in the CCR or obtained through probabilistic linkages to provincial health insurance registries, were used to deterministically link prostate, female breast, colorectal and lung cancers diagnosed from 2005 through 2008 with the DAD for fiscal years 2004/2005 to 2010/2011.
Results
At least 98% of tumours diagnosed from 2005 through 2008 had valid HINs in the CCR or obtained through probabilistic linkages. For provinces submitting day surgeries to the DAD, linkage rates to at least one DAD record were higher for female breast (95.6% to 98.1%), colorectal (96.9% to 98.7%) and lung cancers (92.8% to 96.3%) than for prostate cancers (77.2% to 91.6%). Among linked records, agreement was high for sex (99% or more) and complete date of birth (97% or more); the likelihood of a consistent diagnosis in the CCR and on at least one linked DAD record was higher for female breast (86.8% to 97.2%), colorectal (94.6% to 97.7%) and lung cancers (90.3% to 95.5%) than for prostate cancers (77.4% to 87.8%).
Interpretation
Deterministically linking the CCR and DAD using personal HINs is a feasible and valid approach to obtaining hospitalization information about cancer patients.
Keywords
Administrative databases, data linkage, health care, health insurance number
Findings
Data linkages enhance the usefulness of information in different sources (for example, administrative databases, censuses, surveys) and provide insight not available when data sources are used in isolation. Linking information from cancer registries to administrative health data offers opportunities to study health care use patterns (including treatment) of cancer patients. The Canadian Cancer Registry (CCR), which contains unique patient identifiers that facilitate record linkage, has been probabilistically linked to census and mortality data to examine cancer outcomes for key subgroups. [Full Text]
Authors
Dianne Zakaria (dianne.zakaria@phac-apsc.gc.ca) is with the Public Health Agency of Canada. Richard Trudeau and Patricia Murison are with the Health Statistics Division and Claudia Sanmartin and Gisèle Carrière are with the Health Analysis Division at Statistics Canada. Maureen MacIntyre is with Cancer Care Nova Scotia. Donna Turner is with CancerCare Manitoba and the University of Manitoba. Brandon Wagar is with the Canadian Institute for Health Information. Mary Jane King is with Cancer Care Ontario. Kim Vriends is with the Prince Edward Island Cancer Registry. Ryan Woods is with the British Columbia Cancer Registry. Gina Lockwood is with the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer. Rabiâ Louchini is with the Fichier des Tumeurs du Québec.
What is already known on this subject?
- Data linkages increase the utility of information in different sources and offer analytical possibilities beyond what is available when data sources are used in isolation.
- Probabilistic linkages involving the Canadian Cancer Registry (CCR) have been performed based on personal information such as name, date of birth, sex, and postal code.
- The Discharge Abstract Database (DAD) contains health insurance numbers (HINs) that can be used to deterministically link to the CCR, but the feasibility of such a linkage is unknown.
What does this study adds?
- Deterministically linking the CCR and the DAD using personal HINs is feasible and a valid way to obtain hospitalization information about people with primary cancers.
- Linkage rates reflected differences across provinces in records submitted to the DAD and in clinical practice for the four most commonly diagnosed cancers: prostate, female breast, colorectal and lung cancer.
- Among linked records, agreement on basic identifiers was high, and the occurrence of consistent diagnoses and out-of-province hospitalizations was in line with expectations.
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