The Hospital de Câncer de Barretos Registry: an analysis of cancer survival at a single institution in Brazil over a 10-year period

BACKGROUND: Epidemiological studies that describe cancer survival statistics at specific hospitals are scarce. Cancer registries, which are collections of cancer patient characteristics, treatment and outcome data, help determine quality of care and treatment indicators. METHODS: This study analysed data from patients treated between 2000 and 2009 at the Hospital de Câncer de Barretos, a referral cancer hospital in Brazil. The analysis included all cases among the nine most common types of cancer diagnosed between 2000 and 2009. The main characteristics of the patients, tumours, treatment procedures and survival were described and discussed. The five-year survival rate of patients with cancer diagnosed between 2000 and 2005 were estimated using Kaplan-Meier methods. Multivariable analysis was performed using Cox proportional hazards regression. RESULTS: It was analyzed 42,825 cancer cases relating to the nine primary locations in more frequent at the institution. Most of the patients were men (52.8%) and over the age of 60 years (65.1%). Approximately 1% of the treated cancers were not staged, and 0.4% lacked follow-up data. Excluding nonmelanoma skin cancer, the most common tumours were prostate and breast cancer, which were mainly diagnosed at early stages. Five-year survival for these cancers were 78.2% and 74.8%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: During this ten-year period, the Hospital de Câncer de Barretos Registry collected, processed and analysed data related to all cases treated at the institution, providing relevant information about patient characteristics and survival.