A new PCORnet® Population Insights Report offers a national-scale look at the characteristics of more than 4 million patients with cancer and their healthcare experiences. The report includes patients who received healthcare services at sites participating in PCORnet in 2025 who received a diagnosis of cancer between 2021-2025 according to their electronic health records.
With more than 4 million cancer patients represented across the network and 41.5% receiving healthcare services at community cancer care sites, the PCORnet infrastructure offers a strong foundation for generalizable observational studies and pragmatic trials.
Within this population of patients, the report provides insights into the prevalence of specific cancers.
| Cancer Type | Patients | Percent |
| Skin cancer | 817,552 | 20.4% |
| Breast cancer | 723,400 | 18.1% |
| Prostate cancer | 640,257 | 16.0% |
| Lung cancer | 239,246 | 6.0% |
| Other lymphomas | 225,545 | 5.6% |
| Colorectal cancer | 223,757 | 5.6% |
| Leukemia | 200,284 | 5.0% |
The report captures the occurrence of several other types of cancers, along with the patient population’s demographic and geographic characteristics, care settings, co-occurring cancer conditions, cancer-related therapies and medications, and procedures including cancer screenings. Some key takeaways from the population of patients with cancer include:
- 15.6% of patients had metastatic cancer.
- More patients received targeted therapy (12.2%) than traditional chemotherapy (5.6%).
- Immunotherapy (0.7%) and gene therapy (0.1%) were relatively rare and concentrated in specific cancers.
- 26.3% of patients used telehealth.
Cancer affects millions of people across the United States each year, touching nearly every community and every stage of life. These timely real-world insights can help researchers identify opportunities for studies to improve prevention, diagnosis, treatment, survivorship, and end-of-life care, and answer questions most important to patients with cancer.
The report joins a growing collection of Population Insights Reports, some of which offer the largest national query of real-world data on specific health conditions, populations, or use of healthcare services. These reports illustrate how PCORnet-accessible data can support patient-centered health research planning and help advance evidence that is relevant and usable for patients, caregivers, and the broader healthcare community. Reports on several healthcare topics, along with highlights and illustrations, are available on the Population Insights page.
Contact the PCORnet® Front Door to learn how you can use PCORnet resources to support your patient-centered health research.