Doctors: National cancer registry saves hundreds of lives

Since the advent of the national cancer registry, hundreds of fewer deaths on operating tables each year. This is according to information from the association of professional associations of doctors DICA, Parool reports. The figures will be presented at a conference in Amsterdam on Thursday. Six years ago surgeons stared with the uniform registration of cancer patients and treatments. On the registry surgeons can see how colleagues in other hospitals approach treatments and the result thereof. If their own figures are lower than the rest of the country, they can adapt their treatment method. The DICA figures show that there has been a large decrease in the number of patients dying as the result of a surgery removing a tumor from the colon or rectum - which is considered a major operation with a significant risk. In 2009 5.2 percent of these patients died as a result of this operation, last year it was only 2.3 percent of the patient. That is about 200 fewer deaths per year. The operating rates for two other cancers also improved after the introduction of the interactive registration. In 2011 8.5 percent of patients operated for gastric cancer passed away, last year it was only 4.5 percent - 30 fewer deaths annually. In 2011 5.5 percent of women operated on for breast cancer had tumor tissue left behind, in 2014 it was 4.0 percent. There may be a number of reasons for the improved figures, but according to DICA director Eric Hans Eddes, the improvement can largely be attributed to the national uniform registration. "With every condition we register in this manner, we send a monthly oversight to all hospitals, and you immediately see that doctors look at it and improve quality. Where in the beginning there were major differences, after the register hospitals are quickly growing towards each other." he said to Parool.