The Atlas utilises data for the fiscal year 1999/2000. However an application for more extensive data (i.e. 1996 – 2001) is currently being made to the Ministry of Health and the current tables will be updated in due course. Phase I, which will itself be extended, is the first in a series of five phases. These are discussed in general terms below.
Phase I
After review by the BC Surgical Oncology Council & Network, some limited interpretation of the surgical oncology volumes tables will be provided. As noted in the Table Organisation, such interpretation must necessarily be cautious because the full circumstances of various scenarios are unknown.
While the ICES Ontario classification of surgical oncology procedures is reasonably extensive, some sites such as cranial and oesophageus are not well covered. Attempts will be made to extend the tables into such areas.
Another extension proposed to the ICES Ontario template, is to consider diagnostic and palliative surgical procedures, which is beyond the current focus of therapeutic procedures.
Phase II
This phase will concentrate on in-hospital morbidity (e.g. length of stay) and mortality measures (e.g. operative mortality) available from the DAD (hospital discharge) database. With this and later phases, initial comparisons will be restricted to categories of hospital size.
Phase III
Following on from phase II, Vital Statistics mortality information will be merged with the DAD database to provide 30 day (perioperative mortality) and one-year cancer related mortality rates.
Phase IV
Application is being made to merge the DAD database with the adjuvant therapy databases of the BC Cancer Agency. If this is possible, then a fuller picture of surgical oncology cases will be possible.
Phase V
The new dataset to be obtained from the Ministry of Health will include MSP procedures as well and will allow the Network & Council to investigate the frequency of major ablative procedures, which were not preceded by mildly invasive diagnostic procedures such as fine needle biopsies.