Prostate cancer survival in South West Victoria.

Objective: To explore reasons for survival disparities for patients with prostate cancer in the Barwon South West area of Victoria.

Design, Setting And Participants: We have described incidence, diagnostics, treatment pathways, and survival for four regions of the Barwon South Western Victoria. Analysis included all newly diagnosed prostate cancer patients from 2009 to 2015 in the Evaluation of Cancer Outcomes Barwon South West Registry.

Population-based analysis of radiotherapy and chemotherapy treatment in the last month of life within regional Australia.

Background: Cancer treatment near end of life is not likely to add meaningful benefit and minimising intervention rates has been promoted as an indicator of quality of care. Population-based analysis of treatment allows comparative analysis of treatment rates and provides insight into patterns of care.

Aims: To report a population-based analysis of both radiotherapy and active systemic therapy (AST) delivery rates along with patterns of treatment within the last 14 and 30 days of life.

Use of clinical quality indicators to improve lung cancer care in a regional/rural network of health services.

Problem: Optimal lung cancer care requires multidisciplinary team input, with access to specialised diagnostic and therapeutic services that may be limited in rural or regional areas and impact clinical outcomes. Clinical quality indicators can be used to measure the quality of care delivered to patients with lung cancer in a region and identify areas for improvement. We describe the implementation of internationally recognised clinical quality indicators for lung cancer care in the Barwon South Western region.

Cancer diagnosed in the Emergency Department of a Regional Health Service.

Objective: Patients diagnosed with cancer in the Emergency Department (ED) have more advanced disease at diagnosis and poorer outcomes. High rates of initial presentation to ED suggest potential problems with access to care. The aim of this project was to interpret findings in regional/rural Victoria and explore implications for practice.

Retrospective analysis of cancer survival across South-Western Victoria in Australia.

Objective: This paper aims to describe cancer survival and examine association between survival and socio-demographic characteristics across Barwon South-Western region (BSWR) in Victoria, Australia.

Design: This study is based on the retrospective cohort database of patients accessing oncology services across BSWR.

Setting: Six rural and three urban hospital settings across the BSWR.

Characteristics of cancer diagnoses and staging in South Western Victoria: a rural perspective.

Objective: Australian states and territories have legislation mandating reporting of cancer diagnoses; however, tumour stage at diagnosis, treatment plan and associated outcomes are not routinely recorded in cancer registries for all tumour types. This study describes the Evaluation of Cancer Outcomes study that collects detailed information for patients diagnosed with cancer in south-western Victoria.

Design: Retrospective data collection.

Radiotherapy in the Barwon South Western Region: a rural perspective.

Introduction: Cancer-related mortality rates are higher in rural areas compared with urban regions. Whether there are corresponding geographical variations in radiotherapy utilisation rates (RURs) is the subject of this study.

Methods: RURs for the regional centre of Geelong and rural areas of the Barwon South Western Region were calculated using a population-based database (2009).

Machine-learning prediction of cancer survival: a retrospective study using electronic administrative records and a cancer registry.

Objectives: Using the prediction of cancer outcome as a model, we have tested the hypothesis that through analysing routinely collected digital data contained in an electronic administrative record (EAR), using machine-learning techniques, we could enhance conventional methods in predicting clinical outcomes.

Setting: A regional cancer centre in Australia.

Participants: Disease-specific data from a purpose-built cancer registry (Evaluation of Cancer Outcomes (ECO)) from 869 patients were used to predict survival at 6, 12 and 24 months.