Memorial Heroes: Deanna Escobedo, Certified Tumor Registrar
April 9, 2021
What is your official title?
Cancer Tumor Registrar (CTR).
How long have you worked here at Memorial Medical Center?
14 years total with MMC and three of those years with MMC Cancer Center
How did you come into this position?
I was a student at Santa Barbara College and did an interview with David, the CTR at the time. Lynn and David were kind enough to bring me on the team as a student where I could develop and grow as a future CTR for MMC Cancer Center.
What was your motivation for a career in healthcare?
I wanted to make a difference in our community. Quality cancer data is central to the nation’s fight against cancer and cancer registrars are the first link in capturing that data.
What is a typical day like for you?
A typical day is abstracting (data collection) for about four hours. Then preparing for cancer committee or tumor board, as well as importing and exporting cases to the state.
How would you describe your role’s responsibilities?
My responsibilities are to Identify cases, TNM staging, manage the cancer registry database, ensure data completeness, comply with COC standards, analyze and present data, run customized reports, run tumor board, run cancer committee, track patient survival data.
In what areas do you help patients?
Our data collection provides essential information to researchers, healthcare providers, and public health officials to better monitor and advance cancer treatments, conduct research, and improve cancer prevention and screening programs. It is also used to support clinical care of patients and investigation in the causes and effective treatments for many forms of diseases.
What are some of your interests outside of work?
I love to spend time with my fiancé Robert and our two boys Austin and Colton. We love to go camping and hiking on our spare time.
What is your favorite part about working for Memorial Medical Center?
MMC provides a great sense of camaraderie. The team I work with is very focused on overall patient care and I truly love being a part of that.