Date of First Contact (Class)

Field Length:  8

This is the date the patient had initial contact with the facility as either an inpatient or outpatient for diagnosis and/or treatment of a reportable tumor.  For autopsy-only or DCO cases, use the date of death.  When a patient is diagnosed in a staff physician's office, the date of first contact is the date the patient was physically first seen at the reporting facility.  

A case in a multi-facility database may be associated with more than one facility, and this field exists in the class history record for each affiliated facility. When a facility creates or associates itself with a case, this field is automatically filled in with the facility's Date of First Contact (item 30150).