No. 29 July 1999   Projects and Publications News from the Regions Finance ICD-O-3 The international working group, comprising Constance Percy and April Fritz (US National Cancer Institute, USA), Andrew Jack (Leeds, UK), K. Shanmugaratnam (Singapore), Leslie Sobin (Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, USA), Max Parkin and Sharon Whelan (IARC) met twice during 1998, and will hold a final meeting towards the end of 1999, to prepare the third edition of the International Classification of Diseases for Oncology (ICD-O). This revision was impelled by the rapid changes in understanding of and terminology concerning the leukaemias and lymphomas, and the opportunity has been taken to add new terms and to indicate terms which should be considered obsolete throughout the morphology section of the classification. A Field Trial edition was produced in1999 (IARC Internal Technical Report No. 99/003) and sent to over 60 registries worldwide (excluding USA) for field testing. The US National Cancer Institute undertook the field trial in the USA. The many responses from IACR members to the questionnaire about terminology used in the registries sent in 1998 were taken into account in the preparation of this edition. Each participant in the IARC trial is coding a minimum of 400 cancer diagnoses using the new ICD-O, and results are being sent as a case-listing with a commentary on problems encountered. The results of the Field Trial will be analysed in September (both in the US and at IARC) and will serve in the preparation of the final version of ICD-O Third Edition. CANCER IN AFRICA Data on cancer patterns in Africa are sparse, but the considerable effort which has gone into fostering the development of population-based cancer registration in the continent is now bearing fruit. It will only be possible for a minority of African registries to achieve publication in Cancer Incidence in Five Continents due to the circumstances in which they work, with poor medical infrastructure and limited access to diagnostic services, medical and vital records and population denominators. Nonetheless, the information they are producing gives a unique insight into cancer patterns in the continent. It was decided to prepare a publication at IARC to include results from the cancer registries, published case-series or incidence data from the literature, and a comprehensive review of cancer occurrence for selected sites and for the different regions in Africa. Ebrima Bah (The Gambia), Mokhtar Hamdi-Chérif (Algeria), Freddy Sitas (South Africa) and Henry Wabinga (Uganda) are representing the North, South, East and West of the continent among the editors. Data from over 20 cancer registries in Africa are being analysed and tables of incidence or relative frequency prepared. The book will be published in 2000. AUTOMATED DATA COLLECTION IN CANCER REGISTRATION This introduction to automating cancer registry procedure is the result of a meeting organized jointly by the Enropean Network of Cancer Registries (ENCR) and the Veneto Cancer Registry. It discusses general issues of automated systems, such as: data capture; transfer and security; computerized record linkage in cancer registries; summarizing of information required for cancer registration from multiple data; quality control problems; automated diagnostic coding and conversion; and dedicated computer networks. Reference Black RJ, Simonato L, Storm HH and Demaret E. IARC Technical Report No. 32, Lyon, 1998 CANCER REGISTRATION TECHNIQUES IN THE NEW INDEPENDENT STATES OF THE FORMER SOVIET UNION Understanding current cancer registration practices in the New Independent States (NIS) requires some knowledge of the political and cultural context in which and for which the system was initially designed. This report begins with some general information about the Soviet Union, including the historical development of its social and administrative system, of which health care is an integral part. The report then describes the principles of the health care system for which the system of compulsory cancer registration was designed and in which it still functions and details the process of cancer registration since 1953, including recent developments in computerised cancer registration in Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine. The report concludes by discussing the extent to which cancer registration in the NIS is comparable to that in western countries. Reference Winkelmann RA, Okeanov A, Gulak L, Remmenik L, Rahu M. and Storm HH (eds) IARC Technical Report No. 35, Lyon 1999 Members are reminded that any publications of the International Agency for Research on Cancer which have been produced in collaboration with the Association (they have the IACR symbol and name on the cover) can be purchased with a 30% discount. If you wish to order publications contact press@iarc.fr (or fax 33 4 72 73 83 02), and specify that you are an IACR member and want the IACR discount. News from the Regions Finance