September 2022 Newsletter

ERS is pleased to announce their partnership with Nursenav, a market leader for oncology navigation software, and the integration of their flagship software solutions, CRStar and CONNECT. This integration leverages cancer registry workflows and data collection to support services provided by oncology navigation.

The CRStar and CONNECT integration optimizes the central role of the cancer registry, provides an efficient and time-saving workflow to support delivery of survivorship care plans and most importantly, benefits cancer survivors.

Our Cancer Center Showcase continues this month with Augusta Health located in Virginia’s beautiful Shenandoah Valley. Augusta Health’s main campus and cancer center are both located in Fishersville, VA, with 18 primary care, internal medicine and urgent care facilities serving the surrounding communities of the Shenandoah Valley.

The cancer registry at Augusta Health began in 1991 and became CoC accredited in 1994, achieving NAPBC accreditation status in 2014. The registry currently accessions 850 analytic cases annually, with an additional 100 non-analytic cases. They follow roughly 5,000 patients annually. The registry is managed by Jessica Washington, CTR, who is joined by an additional CTR, both who work from home. Jessie was recently recognized for her 25 years of service to Augusta Health and for her commitment to the program.

Augusta Health currently holds four weekly tumor boards: one general, one thoracic and two breast tumor boards. The registry staff participates …

During the coronavirus pandemic, national guidelines recommended that elective surgery be deferred when hospital resources are limited. The impact of this delay on outcomes of patients with cancer is unknown. A recent study evaluated the effect of delay of surgery for esophageal cancer during the period 2010-2017. Using the data from the National Cancer Database, to which our COC accredited registries contribute, the effect of surgical delay for esophageal cancer has recently been reported (Journal of the American College of Surgeons, August 2022).

An analysis of survival of patients with stage I esophageal cancer who received early (0 to 4 weeks after diagnosis) vs delayed esophagectomy (12 to 16 weeks) was performed. A similar review was undertaken of patients with stage II/III esophageal cancer who - after receiving timely chemoradiation (0 to 4 weeks after diagnosis) - underwent early (9 to 17 weeks) vs delayed esophagectomy (21 to 29 weeks).

The results showed that in patients with stage I cancer, early esophagectomy was associated with similar survival compared with delayed esophagectomy. For patients with stage II/III esophageal cancer, early esophagectomy was associated with improved survival relative to delayed esophagectomy. These are important findings which may eventually be found to exist in patients having delayed treatment during the COVID-19 pandemic.



The important message is that the time course from date of diagnosis to definitive treatment of patients collated by cancer registrars and included into cancer registries is critical to the analysis of these findings.

Are you providing the oncology service line with migration information from the registry? When patients that live in your facility’s primary service area are going for diagnosis and treatment elsewhere, this can pose a problem for the facility’s financial wellbeing and should be addressed to examine the problem and identify cracks in the system quickly and addressed efficiently. 

Data from the cancer registry examining out migration patterns can provide vital information to answer these important questions:

• What is the volume of patients seeking care elsewhere?
• What demographic area are these patients in?
• What facilities are these patients going to for diagnosis and treatment?
• Who are the referring physicians?

Providing data to answer these questions can help the oncology service line identify revenue being lost and assist with creating a plan to address the issue by targeting specific populations of patients by category to help retain patients and regrow your facility’s market share.

CRStar can assist in multiple ways to easily provide this data to the service line. Our dashboard reports automatically population data for:

• In and Out Migration Patterns
• Facility Referred to and From 
• County at Diagnosis by Site
• Calls of Case by Site



More in depth reporting can be generated by using the various Ad hoc reports available in the reporting module. Below is an example revealing facility referred to by referring physician for Colorectal cases using the Ad hoc Cross Tabulation report.

The latest episode of the Cancer Registry World podcast featuring guest Lejla Hadzikadic-Gusic, MD, a breast surgeon at the Atrium Health Levine Cancer Institute, is available now! She joins Dr. Greene to discuss the role of the cancer registry in providing data to clinicians who care for cancer patients. She also discusses the global implications and importance of cancer registries and reviews her goal of creating meaningful registries in her homeland of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Previous episodes with guests William Laffey, retired cancer administrator and CoC site visitor, Rohit Nayak, CEO of ERS, Mellisa Wheeler, Director of Community Outreach at Atrium Health Levine Cancer Institute, Lillie D. Shockney, Co-Founder of AONN+, and NCRA President, Karen Mason, are still available on our website or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts, including ApplePodcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeartRadio and TuneIn.

Oldest CoC Accredited Cancer Programs

The CoC recently recognized the oldest CoC Accredited programs dating back to 1932. Among those were several ERS partners. ERS would like to recognize and congratulate the following health systems on the success and longevity of their cancer programs!

• Henry Ford Health System -1931
• Baylor, Scott and White – 1932

2020 Annual CQIP Report

The NCDB has released the annual Cancer Quality Improvement Program (CQIP) report. This report provides CoC accredited programs with valuable quality and outcomes data based on data submitted to the NCDB. Programs can access the data through the Quality Port. For more information, click the following link.

New NAACCR 2023 Implementation Guidelines

The 2023 NAACCR Implementation Guidelines were released in August 2022. The guidelines inform all cancer registries and stakeholders of expected changes with cases diagnosed beginning in January 2023. It is recommended for all cancer registries to familiarize yourselves with the upcoming changes. Please click the link below to access and download the guidelines.

Do you love CRStar?

So do we and we are offering our loyal customers the chance to earn a $200 gift card when a Cancer Program that you refer becomes an ERS customer!

Please click "Refer CRStar" below if you know of any Cancer Programs that could benefit from CRStar and the advantages that CRStar users enjoy and rely on.

Let's grow our CRStar community together!

Terms and conditions can be found on the CRStar Referral Form.

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