A measure of how accessible to an urban center a cancer patient’s census tract at diagnosis is based on the USDA identification of urban and rural commuting areas. The variable is a binomial—either in an urban commuting area or not. The measure indicates proximity to large urban centers and can be an indicator of access to oncology specialists and cancer treatment facilities. Collecting the variable with each decennial census allows for retrospective and cross-sectional epidemiologic analysis.

This is an update to existing fields. To allow flexibility of research questions, all years of RUCA can be collected for all cases, but cases diagnosed 2016 forward should have RUCA 2020 appended using NAACCR*Prep or File*Pro.

This variable is not coded directly. This data item is generated during CFD by NAACCR*Prep or File*Pro at any time.