CORPUS CHRISTI, TX – Christus Spohn Cancer Center in the past several months has managed to clear a backlog of required data entries, after outsourcing the work to a company specializes in handling healthcare information.

An acute shortage of CTRs – certified tumor registrars – combined with abstracting backlogs and new reporting requirements, are creating urgency for registries nationwide.

Christus Spohn, which bills itself as leading the fight against cancer, was losing its battle to input critical information into the nationwide cancer registry. By Texas law and the standards of the American College of Surgeons the center was delinquent.

“We were 18 months behind, and we were not gaining any ground,” said Tim Osterholm, executive director of oncology and imaging services for the center.

The center, which is part of the six-hospital Christus Spohnn Health System, takes on 1,700 new cases a year in Corpus Christie and an additional 300 in the rural areas.

In Texas, if a provider is not compliant within the six-month window, the state performs the abstracting function for the provider organization.

“They bring in their own abstractors and bill you for it,” Osterholm said.

Osterholm knew there was a shortage of certified tumor registrars in Texas – and across the nation, He had tried a staffing agency, and it could not find the right people. That’s when Osterholm and his team decided to look for companies that might provide this type of outsourcing service and found SDS – Smart Document Solutions.

Based in Alpharetta, Ga., the company uses technology to handle reams of documents for healthcare organizations.  In mid 2006 it announced a new outsourcing option, remote cancer registry services.

Within five months, the SDS team completed all backlogged cases.

“The partnership with SDS is really smooth and working great,” said Maggie Salinas, certified tumor registrar and coordinator of the Christus Spohn Cancer Registry.

Osterholm figures that at $45 an abstract, the center is saving money. Hiring three staff registrars, if he could, would cost more than $200,000 a year.

The SDS Cancer Registry outsourcing program provides industry experienced and National Cancer Registrars Association certified staff to handle the abstracting of cancer cases for accreditation purposes. In addition to typical on-site staffing, remote staffing is available to address departmental space constraints, budgets that can’t accommodate travel and expense charges, and larger abstracting projects that require around-the-clock attention.

The concern – nationwide – is whether all cases are being reported, said Donna Didier, a healthcare consultant who works with SDS.

“This is where cancer survivor statistics come from,” she said. In the past, registries existed in some places, but not others, she said, Today, they exist in each state.

Registrars can abstract data from one or two cases in one hour, she said. There are about 150 data elements to enter into computerized fields.

To make sure the registrars have all the required data, the cancer center requires physicians to till out a “staging” form prior to discharge.

“The only way this can work is if you have an electronic health record,” said Osterholm.