Redaniel et al. BMC Cancer 2010, 10:100 http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2407/10/100 priority, for both patients and health practitioners. The comparison between Filipino-Americans and Caucasians indicates that CRC survival can be similar in different ethnic groups, given comparable access to health care. List of abbreviations used API: Asian and Pacific Islanders; AS: Absolute survival; CI: Confidence intervals; CRC: Colorectal cancer; DCO: Death certificates only; DCN: Death certificate notifica- tions; DOH-RCR: Department of Health-Rizal Cancer Registry; RR: Relative risk; IACR: International Associa- tion of Cancer Registries; IARC: International Agency for Research on Cancer; ICD-O: International Classifica- tion of Diseases for Oncology; NCR: National Capital Region; NHW: non-Hispanic White; PCS-MCR: Philip- pine Cancer Society-Manila Cancer Registry; RS: Rela- tive survival; SE: Standard error; SEER: Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results; WSCPP: World Standard Cancer Patient Population; US: United States. Acknowledgements Our thanks go out to the staff of the Manila and Rizal Cancer Registries (Siony Alcos, Zoila Bautista, Lydia Navarro, Ellen Santos, Antonette Tad-y, Minda Turano, Melinda Visoria, Wilma Grafilo, Tess Medes, Herly Sy-Menco, Elena Marquez, Josephine Isla, Portia de Guzman and Arlene Sasot) who facilitated data abstraction and patient follow-up. The work of Maria Theresa Redaniel was supported by a scholarship from the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). Author details 1Division of Clinical Epidemiology and Aging Research, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany. 2Manila Cancer Registry, Philippine Cancer Society, Manila, Philippines. 3Department of Surgery, Philippine General Hospital, University of the Philippines-Manila, Manila, Philippines. 4Department of Health-Rizal Cancer Registry, Rizal Medical Center, Pasig City, Philippines. Authors’ contributions The contributions of the authors are as follows: MTR contributed in the planning of the study, supervised data collection, performed the analysis and wrote the manuscript; AL, MRL and GU planned and supervised data collection, reviewed and edited registry abstracts, and performed data management; AG assisted in the analysis; HB contributed in the planning of the study and supervised data analysis and writing of the manuscript. All authors have read and approved the final manuscript. Competing interests The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Received: 28 September 2009 Accepted: 16 March 2010 Published: 16 March 2010 References 1. Parkin D, Bray F, Ferlay J, Pisani P: Global cancer statistics, 2002. CA Cancer J Clin 2005, 55:74-108. 2. 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