Cancer

While awaiting the introduction of the future surveillance system for asbestos exposures and their related diseases, we created the descriptive epidemiological portrait of two of these health problems, malignant mesothelioma and asbestosis. It was constructed using the data from statutory databases available at the ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux: the Fichier des tumeurs du Québec (tumour registry) for cancer incidence, the Fichier des décès (death registry) for mortality and…

Since 2000, cancer has been the main cause of death in Quebec (Institut de la statistique du Québec, 2003). However, the standardized death rate due to cancer, like most other causes of death, has been declining steadily since the early 1990s (ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux, 2003; ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux, 2004), while life expectancy at birth of the Quebec population has increased in recent decades. With the number of seniors growing steadily and the risk…

Interval cancers are cancers that are diagnosed during the interval between a negative screen and the subsequent screen. The rate of interval cancers is a performance indicator in the terms of reference of the Quebec Breast Cancer Screening Program (PQDCS). The PQDCS terms of reference do not set a standard for interval cancer rates, but the Evaluation Indicators Working Group, which monitors breast cancer screening programs in Canada, has determined that the rate of interval cancers should…

Premature mortality caused by cancer and the public health challenge it represents have given rise to a myriad of studies on the contribution of material and social living conditions to varying risks of morbidity and mortality. Thus, European and American studies have shown that cancer mortality—and some cancers more than others—often hits disadvantaged socioeconomic groups and regions hardest, and that this relationship persists even when individual behavior is taken into account. Numerous…

Under the auspices of the Comité aviseur sur l'amiante au Québec (asbestos advisory committee), the sub-committee on the epidemiology of asbestos-related diseases reviewed the available epidemiological data on these diseases in Quebec. The sub-committee also conducted various studies to fill in certain gaps identified during the analysis of available data. 

The findings that have been summarized here show a statistically significant increase in the incidence of mesothelioma of…

Cancer registries are essential tools for monitoring cancer. There are four main components to the quality of this type of registry: completeness, validity of data, timeliness of access to data, and range of data available.

Completeness refers to the ability of a cancer registry to identify and register all new cancer cases diagnosed within a population. Completeness can vary considerably from one place to another, because of variations in resources and data collection methods, or…

In May 2002, in cooperation with the Ministère de la Santé et Services sociaux, the Institut national de santé publique du Québec (INSPQ) published survival tables for the four main cancer sites—lung, breast (female), colorectal, and prostate—for cases reported to the Quebec Cancer Registry (QCR) in 1992. These cases were used to calculate the relative survival probability five years after diagnosis.

The study was designed to measure the quality of the incidence and mortality data…

The main purpose of this study is to describe the quality of the data used to calculate survival in Quebec. The discussion will focus on the quality of incidence and mortality data, the kind of file linkage needed to determine a person’s vital status, and the influence that this data quality has on survival results. This study is also part of a Canada-wide initiative to quantify cancer survival. Statistics Canada and the Canadian Cancer Survival Analysis Group have produced a Canadian Cancer…