California Cancer Reporting System Standards Volume I: Abstracting and Coding Procedures
Follow the guidelines below for entering the patient’s name. Accurate patient information is important for matching data in the abstract with data about the patient received from other sources.
Reporting facilities must use the same rules for entering names, dates, and other information. Although reporting facility systems may have different name-related data entry requirements, the CCR requires the following information and formatting for patient name.
Enter the patient's last name, first name, middle name, maiden name, and any known alias.
For entering an alias names, see Section III.2.1.1 Entering Names.
Begin at the far left of each field.
Avoid using only uppercase/capitals.
Spaces, hyphens and apostrophes are allowed. Do not use any other punctuation.
Example: A patient with the name “St. James” should be entered in either one of the following ways:
St James
St-James
St’James
Saint James
However you choose to enter the name, with a space, hyphen, apostrophes, or spelled out, all efforts should be made to keep all similar name entries consistent.
Do not enter the gender or marital status-Mr., Mrs., Miss, Ms.-or similar forms of address in other languages before the name. For religious order names, see Section III.2.1.2.
Spell out abbreviated names (e.g., Robt. = Robert).
If the patient is a child under age 18 living with his/her parent(s) or guardian(s), record the name(s) of the parent(s) or guardian(s) in the remarks text field.