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The department of health-Rizal cancer registry (DOH-RCR) was the first population-based cancer registry in the Philippines, established in 1974. Even though cancer is reportable by legislation, cancer registration is pursued by active methods. Data on survival from cancer of the breast registered in 1996-1997 are reported. Followup was carried out by passive and active methods. The proportion of cases with a histological confirmation of cancer diagnosis was 90%; death certificates only (DCOs) constituted 6%; 81% of the total registered were included for the survival analysis. Complete follow-up at five years from the incidence date was 30%. Relative survival rates at one, three and five years were 89%, 56% and 37%, respectively. Five-year age-standardized relative survival was 35%. Five-year relative survival by age group did not display any pattern or trend, and was fluctuating. A majority of cases were diagnosed with a regional spread of disease (44%) followed by localized stage (17%). Five-year absolute survival ratesby extent of disease were localized (65%), regional (35%), distant metastasis (12%) and unknown (35%). Thetrend of 5-year survival for breast cancer decreased from 46% in 1987 to 37% in 1996-1997.

Background: Population-based cancer survival data, a key indicator for monitoring progress against cancer, are not widely available from countries in Africa, Asia, and Central America. The aim of this study is to describe and discuss cancer survival in these regions., Methods: Survival analysis was done for 341 658 patients diagnosed with various cancers from 1990 to 2001 and followed up to 2003, from 25 population-based cancer registries in 12 countries in sub-Saharan Africa (The Gambia, Uganda), Central America (Costa Rica), and Asia (China, India, Pakistan, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand, Turkey). 5-year age-standardised relative survival (ASRS) and observed survival by clinical extent of disease were determined., Findings: For cancers in which prognosis depends on stage at diagnosis, survival was highest in China, South Korea, Singapore, and Turkey and lowest in Uganda and The Gambia. 5-year ASRS ranged from 76-82% for breast cancer, 63-79% for cervical cancer, 71-78% for bladder cancer, and 44-60% for large-bowel cancers in China, Singapore, South Korea, and Turkey. Survival did not exceed 22% for any cancer site in The Gambia; in Uganda, survival did not exceed 13% for any cancer site except breast (46%). Variations in survival correlated with early detection initiatives and level of development of health services., Interpretation: The wide variation in cancer survival between regions emphasises the need for urgent investments in improving awareness, population-based cancer registration, early detection programmes, health-services infrastructure, and human resources., Funding: Association for International Cancer Research (AICR; St Andrews, UK), Association pour la Recherche sur le Cancer (ARC, Villejuif, France), and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (Seattle, USA)., (Copyright 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Death certificates are an important source of information for cancer registries that help to improve completeness of case finding. In many countries where routine mortality data are considered of poor quality, this source is often regarded as being of little value. We evaluated the contribution of death certificates to the total number of registrations in the years 1993-1997, in the Manila Cancer Registry (MCR). We compared the "standard" practice of retrieving clinical information if the death certificate was completed in a hospital, with active search of additional information from the deceased's relatives when the death was certified at home.The standard procedure allowed us to reduce the proportion of cases registered from a death certificate by 5%. The improvement varied significantly among the most common sites with a reduction of 10% for lymphomas to less than 1% for cancers of the cervix.The proportion of liver cancers registered from a death certificate only (DCO), originally 47%, was reduced to 29% by contacting relatives of the deceased patients. In countries with limited investment in information systems, death certificates, even when recognised as being of poor quality, are an important source of information for cancer registries.

Incidence was derived from published data from two population-based registries--the Philippine Cancer Society-Manila Cancer Registry, and the Department of Health-Rizal Cancer Registry, which covered 8.5 million residents (1990 census) of a 1674 sq. km area that comprises Metro Manila and Rizal province. 13 registry clerks actively sought new cancer cases in 96 hospitals and 30 Civil Registry offices. Both registries are members of the International Association of Cancer Registries and receive continuing professional assistance from the International Agency for Research on Cancer. For the period 1988-92, the combined age-standardized incidence rate (ASR) was 43.4 per 100,000 females, making breast cancer the second most common following lung cancer, and the highest among women. Breast cancer ASR in the Manila Registry was the highest in Asia with the exception of the Jews in Israel. Age-specific rates began to rise steeply starting at age-group 30-34 years and peaked at 196.6 for age-group 70-74 years. There were significant differences between cities and municipalities. The rates in the oldest and most urbanized cities were similar to some populations in Europe, South America, and Oceania, and were almost 3 times those of residents in rural municipalities whose new rates were similar to some Asian and African populations. The ASR has doubled in the 13-year period between 1980 and 1992. While the combined rates were still lower than those of Filipino migrants to Hawaii, San Francisco and Los Angeles, rates in some cities had approximated those observed in the migrant populations.