The PCOR-ANZ 2024 Annual Report provides insights drawn from one of the largest prostate cancer datasets, covering ~175,000 men across 250+ hospitals and clinics.

Prostate cancer is the most common cancer among men in Australia and New Zealand. The Prostate Cancer Outcomes Registry – Australia and New Zealand (PCOR-ANZ) has recently released a new report that sheds light on the state of prostate cancer care and trends in outcomes from 2015 to 2022.

 Principally funded by Movember, PCOR-ANZ brings together data from over 175,000 men across 258 hospitals and clinics, covering 72% of men with prostate cancer in Australia and 83% in New Zealand.

What is PCOR-ANZ?

PCOR-ANZ is a clinical quality registry for prostate cancer. You could think of a clinical quality registry like a fitness tracker for cancer care. Just like a fitness tracker collects data about your daily steps, heart rate, and sleep to help you understand your health and improve your fitness, a registry collects data about patients' treatments, their side effects, and outcomes.

Doctors and researchers use this data to figure out what’s working, what isn’t, and how to improve care for everyone. It’s all about tracking, learning, and getting better over time. This research doesn’t just aim to treat the disease—it’s about improving the entire journey of care.

 Key Findings from the Report

The report captures insights from 175,000 people with prostate cancer (55,815 of which have completed patient-reported outcome measures) from 258 hospitals and clinics (with 411 doctors taking part). Key findings include:

 Diagnosis Trends: Use of pre-biopsy MRI has increased dramatically from 5.6% in 2015 to 73% in 2022, with particularly high adoption in the Australian Capital Territory (91%), Queensland (87%), and Victoria (83%). This rise reflects improved diagnostic precision, helping to better identify clinically significant cancers while reducing unnecessary biopsies. The increased use of MRI is an important step toward evidence-based, patient-centered care and supports clinicians in making more accurate treatment decisions.

Treatment Choices: The proportion of men with low-risk prostate cancer managed with Active Surveillance has risen from 66% in 2015 to 85% in 2022, demonstrating strong uptake of best-practice guidelines. This approach helps avoid overtreatment, preserves quality of life, and aligns with contemporary recommendations for safely monitoring low-risk disease. The trend shows growing clinician confidence and patient acceptance in choosing conservative management where appropriate.

Patient-Reported Outcomes: One of the key strengths of the PCOR-ANZ registry is its collection of patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs). PROMs are questionnaires which individuals complete to provide insight about how their treatment has impacted their overall health. These surveys measure aspects like urinary and sexual function, mental wellbeing, and other quality of life measures. For example, men who underwent surgery reported higher rates of urinary incontinence and sexual dysfunction, while those who received hormone therapy were more likely to experience fatigue or a lack of energy.

 Get the Full Picture

Ready to dive into the findings? The full report and a summary version are available for download. Whether you’re a healthcare professional, researcher, or someone affected by prostate cancer, these reports provide essential information about the current state of prostate cancer care across Australia and New Zealand.

    Full report

    Summary

Acknowledgements

We extend our thanks to all the people who have participated in the PCOR-ANZ registry and contributed to this report. Your data is helping us better understand and tackle the challenges that you, and others in your position, are facing.

PCOR-ANZ also relies on the contributions of the clinical community, who work tirelessly to ensure that data is collected accurately and comprehensively. Special thanks go to the members of the PCOR-ANZ Governance Committee, the Advisory Committee, the Data Advisory Committee, the Data Coordination Centre at Monash University, and the teams of Jurisdiction Coordinators and data collectors across Australia and New Zealand.