How a Canadian federal organization integrated synoptic reporting and quality improvement tools to drive a national learning health system in cancer surgery

Accurate and complete surgical and pathology reports are the cornerstone of treatment decisions and cancer care excellence. Synoptic reporting is a process for reporting specific data elements in a specific format in surgical and pathology reports. Since 2007, the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer has led the implementation of synoptic reporting mechanisms across multiple cancer disease sites and jurisdictions across Canada. While the implementation of synoptic reporting has been successful, its use to drive improvements in the quality of cancer care delivery has been lacking. Here we describe the 4-year, national multi-jurisdictional quality improvement initiative to catalyse the use synoptic data to drive cancer system improvements. Resources provided to the jurisdictions included operational funding, training in quality improvement methodology, national forums, expert coaches, and ad hoc monitoring and support. The program emphasized foundational concepts including data literacy, audit and feedback reports, communities of practice, and positive deviance methodology.