Bias in completeness of birthplace data for Asian groups in a population-based cancer registry (United States)
Abstract
Data on place of birth are routinely collected by population-based cancer registries in the United States and are used to study effects of immigration on cancer patterns in Asian migrants, who comprise about a quarter of the US immigrant population. However, the quality of this research, which has the potential for informing cancer etiology and control, is unclear because registry birthplace information is incomplete, and its accuracy has not been examined. We quantified misclassification of birthplace data for Asian cancer patients in the Greater Bay Area Cancer Registry in northern California by comparing registry birthplace information with self-reported birthplace from interview, and then identified sociodemographic and hospital characteristics associated with birthplace completeness and misclassification. Of the 1836 eligible Asian patients, 649 (35%) had unrecorded registry birthplace. For all except Vietnamese, these persons were less likely than those with recorded birthplace to be foreign-born (OR = 0.5, 95% CI = 0.4-0.7), to be diagnosed in public than private hospitals (OR = 0.7, 95% CI = 0.5-0.8) and in teaching than non-teaching hospitals (OR = 0.8, 95% CI = 0.6-1.1), and were more likely to have been diagnosed at a large regional health maintenance organization (OR = 1.7, 95% CI = 1.3-2.2) and after 1995 (OR = 1.6, 95% CI = 1.1-2.1). Among Asians with registry birthplace information (n = 1187), sensitivity and predictive value positive for birthplace exceeded 90…
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Ten of these (66%) identified that the incomplete data led to validity issues, most commonly that these data were not missing at random and had the potential to introduce bias.
“Ten of these (66%) identified that the incomplete data led to validity issues, most commonly that these data were not missing at random and had the potential to introduced bias.12,34,43–50”
From The quality of social determinants data in the electronic health record: a systematic review (2021) · cites this paper as [43]
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“They justify the use of incomplete nativity data by citing both our observations that nativity, where available, is accurate [3, 4], and the previous use of incomplete data.”
BackgroundMethodSelf-citation
- Authors
- Gomez, S. L., Glaser, S. L., Kelsey, J. L., & Lee, M. M.
- Affiliations
- Cancer Prevention Institute of California (US)
- Stanford Medicine (US)
- University of California, San Francisco (US)
- Corresponding author
- Gomez, Scarlett L.
- Venue
- Cancer Causes & Control
- Published
- 2004-04
- Volume
- 15
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 243-253
- ISSN
- 0957-5243 (ISSN-L)
- 1573-7225
- OpenAlex
- W2070038604
- Cited by
- 60
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2024: 2 · 2021: 2 · 2020: 1 · 2019: 1 · 2018: 2 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 2 · 2015: 1 · 2014: 8 · 2013: 4 · 2012: 6
- FWCI
- 1.44
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- Locations
- Cancer Causes & Control (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health (n01cn065107-001)
- National Cancer Institute (T32CA066521, 1T32CA66521, N01-CN-65107)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Oncology › Global Cancer Incidence and Screening
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › Health Information Management › Medical Coding and Health Information
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Survey Methodology and Nonresponse
- Keywords
- data completeness, misclassification, Asian immigrants, cancer registry data quality, hospital characteristics, health maintenance organizations, language preference
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Aged, Asian, California, Emigration and Immigration, Female, Humans, Language, Male, Middle Aged, Neoplasms, Registries, Residence Characteristics, Reproducibility of Results, Cohort Studies, Bias, Odds Ratio, SEER Program
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