Cancer Information Service

Overview

The WMCIU collects information about residents in the West Midlands health region who are diagnosed with cancer. This covers over 5.3 million people and we register over 30,000 new cases of cancer each year.

The WMCIU also houses the West Midlands Breast and Cervical Screening QA Reference Centres which undertake the quality assurance of all breast and cervical screening services in the West Midlands region. If we are to reduce the burden from cancer over the next decade, we must make the best use of this information which means making sure it is accessible.

The Cancer Information Service (CIS) is one part of this process and allows health workers to access the most up to date cancer surveillance data from their own desktop PC.

Some of the things that the CIS enables you to do include:

1. Look at the number of registrations displayed over time by site and trust
The Registration and Data Quality module provides information on the quality of data received by the WMCIU.

2. Change Display Format
The data can be displayed on the CIS in different formats; tabular, graphically and where appropriate as a map.

3. Change Variables
Variables such as time period, geographical area, sex, cancer site, and age can all be changed depending on your requirements.

4. Look at cancer Incidence data by PCT plotted as a map
Data can also be shown by other geographical areas e.g. health authorities, wards and also by health region (England & Wales).

5. Look at trends in cancer Mortality by cancer site, health region and sex

6. Look at outcome measures from the Breast Screening Programme by screening service
Other outcome data are also available for breast screening services provided by West Midlands laboratories and for England and other regions.

7. Look at NHS Cervical Screening Programme coverage by health authority
Other outcome data are also available for cervical screening services provided by West Midlands laboratories and for England and other regions.