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Working to Improve Outcomes for Women with Gynaecological Cancers

Foundation GOALS: 

1)    Improving the care and outcomes for women suffering from gynaecologic cancer

2)    Establishment of a National Clinical Quality Register and Database to monitor how women are cared for

3)    Educating women and the caring professions in the area of gynaecological cancer

4)    Helping support research in the area of gynaecological cancers

ASGO IS A NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATION

The National Gynae-Oncology Registry (NGOR) is a clinical quality registry (CQR) managed by the Cancer Research Program at Monash University. The registry is currently in a pilot phase, with a primary focus on improving quality of care and patient outcomes for women with ovarian, tubal and peritoneal (OTP) cancers. The registry is supported by the Australian Society of Gynaecologic Oncologists, as well as the CASS Foundation and patient advocacy group Ovarian Cancer Australia. NGOR is led by gynaecologic oncologist and ASGO Past Chairman Associate Professor Robert Rome, and medical oncologist Professor John Zalcberg, Head of the Cancer Research Program and Tony Charlton Chair of Oncology at the Alfred Hospital.

As a CQR, NGOR collects health information about the diagnosis, treatments and outcomes of women with newly diagnosed OTP cancers from hospitals around Australia, and uses this information to monitor and reduce variation in care, improve patient outcomes, and identify trends and potential gaps in service provision.

Since the establishment of the pilot phase in February 2017, the registry’s Steering Committee, a governance group whose members include clinical experts, representatives from the registry partners, and CQR experts, has developed a set of nine quality indicators that reflect measurable aspects of care that are considered to be ‘best practice’. Hospitals and clinicians participating in the registry will, upon registry maturity, receive benchmarked risk-adjusted reports illustrating performance against these indicators, and these reports can be used to ensure quality of care is equitable and of the highest achievable standard for women across the country. 

At present, there are 11 public and private hospitals and health services across Victoria, Tasmania and New South Wales participating in the registry, with eight of these sites now actively contributing patient data. Another five hospitals in Victoria, New South Wales and Western Australia are in the process of joining the registry. To date, 15 gynaecologic oncologists (ASGO members) and two medical oncologists specialising in the treatment of OTP cancers are actively engaged with the registry, and there are 238 patients who have been diagnosed with OTP cancer since mid-2017 onwards, participating. Over time, the registry intends to expand its reach to other gynaecological cancers and is working towards 100% population capture. The pilot phase is expected to end in February 2019.

The team behind NGOR are incredibly grateful for the support they have received by the clinical community, the research community, registry partners and most importantly by the patients. We hope to continue to develop the registry, and help ASGO achieve its primary objective of promoting and improving standards of care for women with gynaecologic cancer. 

More information about the registry can be found at ngor.org.au, or by contacting the registry coordinator on (03) 9903 0435 or at ngor@monash.edu.