Hormone therapy for cancer cluster

Hormone therapy is cancer treatment that achieves its antitumour effect through changes in hormonal balance. It includes the administration of hormones, agents acting via hormonal mechanisms, antihormones and steroids.

The hormone therapy cluster consists of those data elements recommended for collection as best practice when the patient is administered hormone therapy as part of the course of treatment for cancer. The hormone therapy cluster collects information on the hormone therapy agent or protocol and the start and finish dates of treatment.

Information on the hormone therapy agent is required to evaluate patterns of care, the effectiveness of different treatment modalities and treatment by patient outcome. Collecting the start and finish dates will enable an estimate of the duration of hormone therapy and the time interval from diagnosis to treatment.

The use of standard definitions and formats supports the consistent collection and management of data and enables the integration of data from different sources. It provides a common language facilitating the interpretation and analysis of results, data linkage for statistical purposes, longitudinal studies and patient patterns of care and outcome studies. These results may then inform professional guidelines and training, quality assurance and the planning and evaluation of cancer control activities, potentially improving outcomes for patients.