The Bremen Cancer Registry consists of a trust and analysis center. In the trust center, data with names and addresses are processed. The analysis center only analyzes data without reference to names. The Bremen Cancer Registry is located at the Leibniz Institute for Prevention Research and Epidemiology – BIPS. BIPS is also responsible for the tasks in the analysis center. The Bremen Association of Statutory Health Insurance of Physicians is responsible for the tasks in the trust center. The Senator for Health, Women and Consumer Protection supervises the Bremen Cancer Registry. The aim of our work is to contribute to the improvement of the medical-oncological treatment and care and thus to increase the chances of survival and the quality of life of cancer patients. Therefore, the Bremen Cancer Registry collects comprehensive inpatient and outpatient data on the occurrence, treatment and courses of tumor diseases.

Cancer is still the second most common cause of death in Germany after cardiovascular diseases. The aim of cancer registration is to improve the care of tumor patients and to reduce mortality by using the recorded data of the oncological care.

After the Cancer Early Detection and Registration Act (KFRG) came into effect nationwide in April 2013, starting the establishment and expansion of clinical cancer registries, the federal states introduced their own state laws on the basis of the KFRG. On this basis, with the expansion into a clinical-epidemiological cancer registry in 2015, the Bremen Cancer Registry was given the important task of collecting and analyzing clinical and epidemiological data on cancer in the state of Bremen.

Clinical-epidemiological cancer registries document the entire course of a cancer disease. For instance, the diagnosis, performed (primary) therapies, occurred recurrences and the ongoing status of a tumor are recorded. The focus of the obligation to report is based on the receipt of benefits, i.e. every physician reports their own oncological treatment data to the Bremen Cancer Registry. In the cancer registry, a complete picture of the patient’s tumor incidence is thus created if all oncologically active physicians report.

In order to be able to compile and analyze the reports on the diagnosis, therapy, course of disease and aftercare according to the same scheme for further evaluations throughout Germany, the data set to be reported by physicians is defined uniformly. In this way, cancer can be observed on a long-term and supra-regional basis and insights into successes and deficits in oncological care can be obtained.