Show all records from 2000-2018 for patients who have a breast cancer tumor meeting the selection criteria in Case Listing Exercise 1a, and at least one additional malignant cancer diagnosis.

Each patient in the table must have at least 2 tumor records:

  1. a malignant breast cancer diagnosis at age 50+ in Iowa* with a year of diagnosis from 2014-2018 (these are the criteria specified in Case Listing Exercise 1a); and
  2. an additional malignant cancer diagnosis of any type.

Note that the selection for the index tumor is based on diagnoses from 2014-2018 but the output matrix will include tumors diagnosed from 2000-2018.

Key Points

  • Person Selection can be toggled on/off in the Session menu. When off, only tumor records meeting the criteria specified in the selection statement will be included in the matrix. When on, the matrix will include all records for each patient meeting the selection criteria.
  • Narrow the Selection of Persons allows you to select based on a person's cancer history, that is, all of their tumor records. For a person to be included, the statement at the top of the screen and the criteria specified in the Narrow the Selection of Persons section must be TRUE.
  • The options in the Select Only box at the top of the Selection Tab apply to both the index record and the other selected records.
  • Starting with the November 2020 data submission, SEER now uses "Behavior code ICD-O-3" rather than the "Behavior recode for analysis" field. Refer to Behavior Variable Changes for more information..

* You must have access to the Research Plus data to complete this exercise as written for cancer cases in the Iowa registry. Refer to Comparison of SEER Data Products for more information.

Step 1:  Open Case Listing Exercise 1a's Matrix

  • Start SEER*Stat.
  • From the File menu select Open > Case Listing File or use the Open file/folder button on the toolbar.
  • Open the file saved in Case Listing Exercise 1a. The filename should be "Case Listing Exercise 1a.slm".
  • If you did not save the output for exercise 1a you may open our session and then skip to Step 3: Case Listing 1a Session.

Learn More...

  • The Open file/folder button on the toolbar can be used to open any type of SEER*Stat file. It is equivalent to selecting Any SEER*Stat File from the File > Open menu. SEER*Stat will automatically determine the file type and open the appropriate session or matrix. If you prefer, you can specify the type of file you wish to open using the File menu. The only benefit to specifying the type of file is to reduce the number of files listed in the folder. See SEER*Stat's Help System for more information.
  • SEER*Stat uses the ".slm" extension for "SEER*Stat Listing Matrix" files.

Step 2:  Extract the Session

  • SEER*Stat matrix files include the session information used to generate the table. This information serves as documentation for the table and provides a convenient method for generating similar output.
  • From the Matrix menu select Retrieve Session.
  • Two windows should now be open. Close the matrix window containing the table created in Case Listing Exercise 1a. You should now have one window labeled "Case Listing Session-x" where x is the number of case listing session windows that you have created since starting SEER*Stat.

Learn More...

  • SEER*Stat is an MDI application. MDI stands for Multiple Document Interface. Word and Excel are MDIs. That is, they allow you to work with more than one document at a time. With SEER*Stat that means that you can have any combination of session and matrix windows open at the same time.
  • SEER*Stat displays the filename in the title bar of an open window. If the session or matrix is not saved then a generic, numbered label is used ("Case Listing Session-x", "Case Listing Matrix-x", etc).

Step 3:  Verify the Data Tab

  • Since we extracted this session from exercise 1a's matrix file, the "Incidence - SEER Research Plus Limited-Field Data, 21 Registries, Nov 2020 Sub (2000-2018) " database should be selected on the Data Tab.

Step 4:  Modify the Selection Tab

  • Move to the Selection Tab.
  • On the Session menu, turn on Person Selection. SEER*Stat will display a warning indicating that all records for each qualifying person will be included in the matrix. If you executed SEER*Stat now, more records would be included in the table than are in the exercise 1a matrix. These are the additional diagnoses for each person.
  • When Person Selection is on, the Select Only box at the top of the Selection Tab applies the options to both the Index Record and Other Selections. Because we want to find people in the database with malignant breast cancer tumors and at least one additional malignant cancer diagnosis, leave the Malignant Behavior checkbox selected.
  • Check the Narrow the Selection of Persons box that now appears on the Selection Tab. We will use this feature to limit the selection to people with 2 or more tumors (where at least one matches the selection criteria in the top box).
  • Leave the controls set to "Select only persons with a matching index record and at least 1 additional record(s) matching the following:"
  • Do not enter a statement in the lower box. Having no selection indicates that at least 1 additional record of any type is a match. Therefore, the Selection Tab now specifies that we want to see all records for persons with two or more tumors, where at least one matches the criteria at the top.

Learn More...

  • The Person Selection feature is only enabled if the records in the database are grouped by person and are in order of diagnosis (for example, SEER incidence databases are sorted by SEER Registry, Patient ID, and Record number recode). See Multiple Primary Selections in the SEER*Stat help system for more information.
  • The "For every selected person, include" control at the bottom of the screen is always set to "all the person's records" in Case Listing Sessions. These and other person selecting features are discussed in the SEER*Stat help system.
  • SEER*Stat uses "nag" dialogs to present some warning messages. These dialogs include a checkbox to allow you to specify that you do not want to see the message in the future. Note: If you disabled the warning messages, you may turn them back on using the setting on the Preferences dialog under the Profiles Menu.

Step 5:  Modify the Table Tab

  • Add the following to the list of column variables:
    • Site recode ICD-O-3/WHO 2008
    • Behavior code ICD-O-3
  • These were not included in exercise 1a because all records had the same values for these variables (site = breast cancer, behavior = malignant). Due to the inclusion of additional diagnoses, these variables will be of interest.

Step 6:  Edit the Title

  • Move to the Output Tab
  • Modify the title to reflect our changes. The new title should be something like:
    All Tumors for Women with a
    Malignant Breast Cancer Diagnosis in Iowa, 2014-2018, Age 50+ at Dx
    and At Least One Additional Tumor of any Type
    Case Listing Exercise 1b

Learn More...

  • For those of you who are not proficient typists, feel free to copy-and-paste the title from this document to the Output Tab in SEER*Stat.

Step 7:  Execute SEER*Stat

  • Use the Execute button or select Execute from the Session menu to execute the session.
  • Compare your output by executing this SEER*Stat session file: Case Listing Exercise 1b Session.
    • Case listing examples are provided as session files instead of results matrices to ensure they may only be opened by those who have signed a SEER data use agreement and have permission to view individual records.
  • Notice that the number of people in the cohort is listed as a footnote (look at the bottom of the matrix window).