National Cancer Registrars Association
Encyclopedia
The National Cancer Registrars Association (NCRA) is a not-for-profit association representing cancer registry
professionals and Certified Tumor Registrars (CTR). NCRA's primary focus is education
and certification
with the goal to ensure all cancer
registry professionals have the required knowledge to be superior in their field. Worldwide, there are over 5,000 NCRA members and nearly 4,500 CTRs.
Cancer Registrars capture a complete summary of the history, diagnosis
, treatment & disease status for every cancer patient. Registrars' work leads to better information that is used in the management of cancer, and ultimately, cures.
NCRA Mission Statement: Serve as the premier education, credentialing and advocacy resource for cancer data professionals.
The cancer registrar is concerned with the development, use, and maintenance of hospital, centralized, or special purpose cancer programs that meet the needs of physicians, administrators, and planners; protect the patients’ rights to privacy; and compliance with ethical and legal requirements of the health care delivery system. To provide members of the Association and other registry professionals with definitive and binding guidelines of conduct, the National Cancer Registrars Association adopted a Professional Practice Code of Ethics, outlining principles of professional conduct.
The Council’s mission is to create and maintain credentialing processes whereby the public can be assured that individuals certified by NCRA have met a level of competence required to provide accurate information for cancer surveillance and research
activities.
NCRA's Council on Certification http://www.ctrexam.org
Cancer registry
A cancer registry is a systematic collection of data about cancer and tumor diseases. The data is collected by Cancer Registrars. Cancer Registrars capture a complete summary of patient history, diagnosis, treatment, and status for every cancer patient in the United States, and other countries as...
professionals and Certified Tumor Registrars (CTR). NCRA's primary focus is education
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
and certification
Certification
Certification refers to the confirmation of certain characteristics of an object, person, or organization. This confirmation is often, but not always, provided by some form of external review, education, assessment, or audit...
with the goal to ensure all cancer
Cancer
Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...
registry professionals have the required knowledge to be superior in their field. Worldwide, there are over 5,000 NCRA members and nearly 4,500 CTRs.
Cancer Registrars capture a complete summary of the history, diagnosis
Diagnosis
Diagnosis is the identification of the nature and cause of anything. Diagnosis is used in many different disciplines with variations in the use of logics, analytics, and experience to determine the cause and effect relationships...
, treatment & disease status for every cancer patient. Registrars' work leads to better information that is used in the management of cancer, and ultimately, cures.
Vision and Mission
NCRA Vision Statement: Improving lives through quality cancer data management.NCRA Mission Statement: Serve as the premier education, credentialing and advocacy resource for cancer data professionals.
- Code of Ethics:
The cancer registrar is concerned with the development, use, and maintenance of hospital, centralized, or special purpose cancer programs that meet the needs of physicians, administrators, and planners; protect the patients’ rights to privacy; and compliance with ethical and legal requirements of the health care delivery system. To provide members of the Association and other registry professionals with definitive and binding guidelines of conduct, the National Cancer Registrars Association adopted a Professional Practice Code of Ethics, outlining principles of professional conduct.
Certified Tumor Registrars certification
Certified Tumor Registrars (CTR) are certified by NCRA's Council on Certification. NCRA’s Council on Certification promotes standardization in the collection and use of cancer data through examination and certification of Cancer Registrars and other cancer data specialists. Since 1983, the CTR credential marks achievement, fosters professional pride, and is nationally recognized in recruitment and retention of registry personnel.The Council’s mission is to create and maintain credentialing processes whereby the public can be assured that individuals certified by NCRA have met a level of competence required to provide accurate information for cancer surveillance and research
Research
Research can be defined as the scientific search for knowledge, or as any systematic investigation, to establish novel facts, solve new or existing problems, prove new ideas, or develop new theories, usually using a scientific method...
activities.
External links
NCRA's Web page http://www.ncra-usa.orgNCRA's Council on Certification http://www.ctrexam.org