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The Bombay Cancer Registry was established
in June 1963 as a Unit of the Indian Cancer Society, at
Bombay, with the aim of obtaining reliable morbidity data on
cancer from a precisely defined urban population (Greater
Bombay). Initially the project was initiated in collaboration
with and received financial support from the Biometry Branch
of the National Cancer Institute of the Department of Health
in Bethesda, U.S.A. upto 1975. During 1976-1980 the project
received grants from the Department of Science and Technology,
the Government of India at New Delhi and from the Indian
Cancer Society. After September, 1981, the registry joined the
National Cancer Registry network programme which is co-ordinated
by the Indian council of Medical Research, New Delhi.
The Bombay registry today, covers more than
100 hospitals and private nursing homes in the metropolitan
area. The majority of hospitals in Bombay are maintained by
the Municipal Corporation and the State Government, which are
responsible for the organisation of medical and public health
services in the city. The main source of data collection is
the Tata Memorial Hospital and Research Institute, a
post-graduate teaching centre of the University and an
autonomous unit supported by the Department of Atomic Energy,
Government of India.
The diagnosis and treatment of cancer is
centralised only to a certain extent in Bombay. Major cancer
surgery is undertaken at all the major hospitals, and in a
number of well equipped private nursing homes in the city.
Facilities for Linear Accelerator Teletherapy are available at
the Tata Memorial Hospital and Cobalt (60) therapy is
available at five institutes, while ortho-voltage deep X-ray
therapy is available in ten other hospitals in the city. Out
of the 100 collaborating hospitals, one is a cancer hospital,
14 are municipal hospitals, 16 are Government hospitals and 18
are charitable trust hospitals.
Staff members personally visit the wards of
the co-operating hospitals regularly, to interview all
identified cancer patients and also those under investigation.
The record files maintained by the various departments of
these hospitals (pathology, haematology, radiology) and the
various specialised surgical and medical wards, are also
examined.
The requisite details obtained for each
patient, are cross-checked with the information collected from
the various departments of the collaborating hospitals to
ensure completeness of records. Full information on every
cancer patient registered at each and every hospital is thus
obtained, irrespective of whether or not the patient is
subsequently treated at the particular hospital. Additional
information is obtained every time a cancer patient is
readmitted or re-examined at the Institution.
Supplementary information is gleaned from
the death records maintained by the Vital Statistics Division
of the Bombay Municipal Corporation. Copies are made of all
death certificates which mention cancer or tumor as the cause
of death. These death certificates are then matched against
the registered cases in the files. Every cancer death not
traceable to an entry in the files is labeled as an "unmatched
death" and the date of death is then taken as the date of
first diagnosis, and is so registered in the corresponding
year's data file. Furthermore, copies of all death
certificates where the term "Cancer" or "tumor" is mentioned
as the cause of death, are individually scrutinized to confirm
the statement.
General medical practitioners who are also
family physicians are not contacted individually, but if any
of them is found to have signed the death certificate of a
patient dying of cancer, then he is approached personally, to
obtain as complete a report as possible of these patients,
whether or not they have already been listed in the Registry.
In many instances, the diagnosis may appear to have been based
on incomplete examination, if the patient had been seen for
the first time in an advanced stage of the disease. The
certifying physician is then again approached personally to
obtain further clarification.
All malignant tumors including those where
the pathologist may have merely suspected a malignant change
are also registered with the registry. |
Cancer Registry
Division
Bombay Cancer Registry