This Federal Project Grant award from the National Cancer Institute (NCI), under the Cancer Cause and Prevention Research program (CFDA 93.393), provides $653,500 to Emory University to develop improved methods for measuring the completeness of cancer registry data over the period from September 2024 to August 2029.
The key objectives are to: (a) develop new statistical methods for estimating cancer registry completeness at the county, race/ethnicity, age, sex, cancer site, and calendar year levels; (b) create methods to decompose registry completeness by demographics and geography to identify areas needing targeted improvement; and (c) deliver a user-friendly analytical tool to enable cancer registries to transparently assess and enhance their data completeness. A subaward of undisclosed amount was provided to the University of Minnesota to contribute to this research project.
By improving the rigor and reproducibility of cancer registry completeness measurement, this project aims to better guide resource allocation decisions by registries and demonstrate potential biases in current understandings of cancer disparities. The resulting computational tools will provide registries with a transparent, data-driven approach to optimizing their data quality.