# Building national cancer registration in a developing country: the Nigerian National System of Cancer Registries

Source: https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-jedy-agba-nscr-front-public-health-2015/  
OnCo record `paper-jedy-agba-nscr-front-public-health-2015` (Key paper). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

A case study of how Nigeria built a national network of cancer registries from 2009, the problems it met and how they were overcome, written as a guide for other low and middle income countries.

## Summary

Published as "Developing National Cancer Registration in Developing Countries: Case Study of the Nigerian National System of Cancer Registries". The paper describes the Nigerian National System of Cancer Registries, conceived in 2009 by the Federal Ministry of Health, the Society of Oncology and Cancer Research of Nigeria and the Institute of Human Virology Nigeria with support from the United States National Institutes of Health. It coordinates registries, strengthens existing ones, establishes new ones, compiles and analyses data, and makes them available to researchers and policy makers. It traces registration back to the Ibadan registry founded in 1960, which contributed to the first three volumes of Cancer Incidence in Five Continents and later stopped submitting data, and records that the Ibadan, Abuja and Calabar registries contributed to GLOBOCAN 2012.

## Fields

- Kind: Key paper
- Last checked: 2026-11-04
- Journal: Frontiers in Public Health
- Year: 2015
- DOI: 10.3389/fpubh.2015.00186
- Authors: Jedy-Agba EE, Oga EA, Odutola M, et al.
- Findings: At least three population-based registries had been established or strengthened, and several hospital-based registries were being mentored towards population-based status.; A table of African registries in 2013 lists Abuja (covering 1,406,239 people, founded 2009), Calabar (647,458, founded 2004) and Ibadan (2,549,265, founded 1960).; Named challenges include Nigeria's large population, limited health infrastructure, poor vital statistics and funding.
- What it means: Explains why Nigeria's cancer figures rest on a few city registries and IARC models, and what it took to start building more.
- Caveats: Written by the network's own team; describes the system up to about 2015.

## Sources

- Front Public Health 2015: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2015.00186
- PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26284233/

## Connected records

- institutions: [National Cancer Registry of Nigeria](https://onco.cc/institutions/nigeria-national-cancer-registry/), [University College Hospital, Ibadan](https://onco.cc/institutions/uch-ibadan/)

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