Date of Diagnosis--Sarcoma: Should the date of diagnosis be coded to the date of biopsy or the date of birth for an infant biopsied at 3 days of age and stated to have a diagnosis of congenital alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma, widely metastatic?
Code the date of the biopsy as the date of diagnosis. This is the date the cancer was first identified by a medical practitioner.
Note: SEER collects the Month and Year of diagnosis. The "day" of diagnosis is not collected by SEER.
Primary Site--Soft Tissue: How is the primary site coded for a PNET found in the groin when the Tumor Board states the primary is unknown but the SEER site/histology validation table does not allow a site of C809 or C76x to be coded in combination with the histology of 9473/3?
Code site to C495 [connective tissue of pelvis, groin].
This was not called metastatic PNET and no other site of disease is noted. PNET is a broad classification of a group of tumors that usually occur in the CNS and can also occur in soft tissue (neuroblastoma, extra-osseous Ewing sarcoma).
Seq no-central--Brain and CNS: How should subsequent tumors be sequenced when the patient has a history of a brain tumor, with no information on the behavior of the brain tumor? According to the sequencing rules, it appears some assumption must be made regarding the behavior of the brain tumor.
Sequence the brain tumor in the 60-87 series when you do not know the behavior. If you have reason to believe the brain tumor was malignant, sequence it in the 00-59 series.
CS Extension--Breast: Is the term "erosion" the same as "ulceration"?
This answer was provided in the context of CSv1 coding guidelines. The response may not be used after your registry database has been converted to CSv2.
"Erosion" is not synonymous with "ulceration" when coding CS extension for breast.
Surgery of Primary Site--Corpus uteri: What is the correct surgery code to assign for dilation and curettage (D&C) for an in-situ endometrium (C541) primary? The code to use for the cervix uteri (C530-C539) is specified, but not for the corpus uteri (C540-C549).
Assign code 20 for endometrial D&C for in situ cancer of endometrium.
Grade/Sarcoma--Breast: Is the correct grade for high grade angiosarcoma of the breast a code 3 or 4? The breast usually uses a three grade system but sarcoma is not a typical histologic type of the breast.
Assign grade code 4 using the sarcoma table. Nottingham or Bloom-Richardson (BR) Score/Grade does not apply to angiosarcomas. This is a good question and points out needed clarification of the grade rules.
Reportability/Histology--Gallbladder: Is intracholecystic papillary-tubular neoplasm (ICPN) with extensive high grade dysplasia of the gallbladder reportable?
Report intracholecystic papillary neoplasm (ICPN) with high-grade dysplasia (8503/2) of the gallbladder.
Multiple primaries--Heme & Lymphoid Neoplasms: Is this abstracted as one primary or two?
5/2/13 Bone Marrow biopsy: myelodysplastic syndrome with approaching to acute myeloid leukemia with del 5q and 7q deletions. FISH: deletion of chromosome 5q and deletion of chromosome 7q detected.
I checked the Heme DB manual and there is no term "With approaching to". I checked the Multiple Primary calculator and it says new primary. My interpretation is that the myelodysplastic syndrome is in the process of transforming to acute myeloid leukemia.
Abstract a single primary, myelodysplastic syndrome with del 5q and 7q deletions (9986/3). This neoplasm can transform to acute myeloid leukemia (AML); however, "with approaching to" cannot be used to report this AML.
Summary Stage 2018/Extension--Prostate: Can imaging be used to code SEER Summary Stage 2018? MRI shows tumor involved the seminal vesicles and the patient did not have surgery. AJCC does not use imaging to clinically TNM stage a prostate case.
Note 5 was changed in Version 2.0.
Per Note 5 of the 2018 SEER Summary Stage Prostate chapter: Imaging is not used to determine the clinical extension. If a physician incorporates imaging findings into their evaluation (including the clinical T category), do not use this information.
This note was changed in Version 2.0 (2021 changes) to be in line with how AJCC stages; therefore, AJCC and Summary Stage agree.