Cancer Gov NCI Syndication API
66
AI ReadinessAI-Aware (B)66/100
Agent-ready OpenAPI document · curated by JenticHealthcareClinical DataapiKey7 EndpointsREST
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For Agents
Search NCI clinical trials, drug dictionary, glossary, sitewide search, Best Bets, and researcher resources from a single consolidated API.
Use for: Search for breast cancer clinical trials open in California, Get the eligibility criteria for a specific clinical trial by NCI ID, Look up the definition of a cancer-related medical term, Find cancer drugs that target a specific molecular pathway
Not supported: Does not handle patient EHR access, trial enrollment workflows, or clinician credentialing - use for searching NCI's public clinical-trial, drug, glossary, and content syndication services only.
Jentic publishes the only available OpenAPI specification for NCI Syndication API, keeping it validated and agent-ready. The National Cancer Institute Syndication API is the consolidated entry point for NCI's public services, including clinical-trial search, the medical glossary, the drug dictionary, sitewide search of cancer.gov, Best Bets editorial picks, and the R4R researcher-resource catalog. Seven GET endpoints expose these services across two host environments and are intended for research portals, oncology decision-support tools, and patient-information agents.
Install Jentic One Beta
Connect the NCI Syndication API to your agent
Jentic One is a self-hosted execution layer for AI agents. It lets your agent call the NCI Syndication API, or any other public or private API you need. You set the rules, the agent never sees your credentials, and every call is logged.
Two steps, two machines. Install the instance in a safe environment, then register your agent from wherever it runs.
1
Step 1: Jentic One Host machine
# On the machine that will host your Jentic One instance:
curl -fsSL "https://jentic.com/install.sh?src=apis&api=%2Fapis%2Fcancer.gov%2Fcancer-gov" | sh2
Step 2: Agent machine
# On the machine where your agent runs (keep this separate from the instance):
curl -fsSL "https://jentic.com/install.sh?src=apis&api=%2Fapis%2Fcancer.gov%2Fcancer-gov" | sh
jentic register # connects your agent to your Jentic One instanceJentic One is in public beta. The setup above keeps your agent separate from the instance, which is what you want before using real credentials: an agent running as the same OS user as Jentic One can read its stored keys directly. Just evaluating? A single local install is fine to start. See the secure deployment guide for the tiers.
Capabilities
What an agent can do with NCI Syndication API.
Search active and completed cancer clinical trials by disease, intervention, location, and phase via /trials
Retrieve a single trial's full record including eligibility criteria via /trials/{nci_id}
Look up cancer-specific medical terminology via /glossary/v1/Terms
Search the NCI drug dictionary for cancer-related medications via /drugdictionary/v1/Drugs
Run sitewide search across cancer.gov content via /sitewidesearch/v1/Search
Fetch curated Best Bets editorial selections for clinical topics via /bestbets/v1/BestBets
Browse the R4R catalog of research resources via /r4r/v1/Resources
Use Cases
Patterns agents use NCI Syndication API for, with concrete tasks.
★ Clinical Trial Matching for Patients
Patient advocacy and decision-support tools help cancer patients find relevant trials. /trials accepts disease, location, age, and intervention filters and returns matching trials with status and lead-organisation details, so a tool can shortlist candidates in seconds. /trials/{nci_id} then loads full eligibility criteria for the patient and clinician to review.
GET /trials with disease='breast cancer', location='Boston, MA', and recruitment_status='OPEN', then GET /trials/{nci_id} for the top result to retrieve eligibility criteria.
Oncology Decision Support and Drug Lookup
Clinical decision-support agents need authoritative drug and term definitions tied to NCI nomenclature. /drugdictionary/v1/Drugs returns drug records including aliases and indications, and /glossary/v1/Terms returns definitions in plain English suitable for surfacing to patients or clinicians inline.
GET /drugdictionary/v1/Drugs filtered by name='pembrolizumab' to retrieve indications, then GET /glossary/v1/Terms for any unfamiliar pathology term referenced in the result.
Patient-Education Content Surfacing
Cancer-information chatbots surface curated content from cancer.gov. /sitewidesearch/v1/Search returns content matches across the site, and /bestbets/v1/BestBets returns editorially-selected pages for high-traffic topics, giving a chatbot a high-quality fallback before generating freeform answers.
GET /bestbets/v1/BestBets for query='chemotherapy side effects' and surface the top editorially-curated link before falling back to /sitewidesearch/v1/Search results.
AI Agent Cancer-Research Workflows via Jentic
Through Jentic, an agent searches for 'find cancer clinical trials', loads the input schema for /trials, and executes the call without managing the X-API-KEY header. Jentic's vault holds the NCI API key so it never enters the agent's prompt context.
Use the Jentic SDK to search 'find cancer clinical trials', load the /trials operation schema, and execute it with disease and location filters supplied by the patient.
Key Endpoints
7 endpoints — jentic publishes the only available openapi specification for nci syndication api, keeping it validated and agent-ready.
METHOD
PATH
DESCRIPTION
GET
/trials
Search NCI clinical trials
GET
/trials/{nci_id}
Retrieve a single clinical trial by NCI ID
GET
/drugdictionary/v1/Drugs
Search the NCI drug dictionary
GET
/glossary/v1/Terms
Search NCI cancer terminology glossary
GET
/sitewidesearch/v1/Search
Sitewide search across cancer.gov
GET
/bestbets/v1/BestBets
Retrieve editorially-curated Best Bets
GET
/r4r/v1/Resources
Search Resources for Researchers
GET
/trials
Search NCI clinical trials
GET
/trials/{nci_id}
Retrieve a single clinical trial by NCI ID
GET
/drugdictionary/v1/Drugs
Search the NCI drug dictionary
GET
/glossary/v1/Terms
Search NCI cancer terminology glossary
GET
/sitewidesearch/v1/Search
Sitewide search across cancer.gov
GET
/bestbets/v1/BestBets
Retrieve editorially-curated Best Bets
GET
/r4r/v1/Resources
Search Resources for Researchers
Jentic AI Readiness Score
This API is usable in Jentic One now. Its AI-readiness score against Jentic's framework shows where it stands today and where improvements would make it even easier for agents to use.
N
NCI Syndication API
- AI-Aware (B)66/100
100
Foundational Compliance63
Developer Experience & Jentic Compatibility47
AI-Readiness & Agent Experience94
Agent Usability50
Security100
AI DiscoverabilityPowered by JenticScoring Framework 1.0.0 | Scoring Engine 0.4.0
Show dimension breakdown
100
Foundational Compliance
Base layer of spec validity and structural soundness.
Grade: A+Signals: 4
98%
Lint Results
Aggregated quality score from linter diagnostics, weighted by severity.
100%
Resolution Completeness
Percentage of `$ref` references that resolve successfully.
100%
Specification Validity
Checks whether the API description parses successfully and conforms to its declared specification (e.g., OpenAPI).
100%
Structural Integrity
Structural correctness score based on schema issues using logarithmic dampening.
63
Developer Experience & Jentic Compatibility
Clarity, completeness, and ingestion readiness for developers and tooling.
Grade: B-Signals: 4
0%
Example Density
How richly the API is illustrated with examples.
100%
Example Validity
Percentage of examples that conform to their schemas.
50%
Response Coverage
Percentage of operations with complete response definitions (success, client error, server error).
100%
Tooling Readiness
Health of API ingestion, bundling, and resolution within Jentic pipelines.
47
AI-Readiness & Agent Experience
Semantic breadth, depth, and agent comprehension for AI systems.
Grade: DSignals: 4
37%
Description Coverage
Coverage of descriptions across API elements.
0%
Error Standardization
Coverage of RFC 9457 Problem Details for error responses.
100%
OperationId Quality
Coverage, uniqueness, and casing consistency of operationIds for AI inference.
50%
Summary Coverage
Coverage of summaries across operations/tags/info.
94
Agent Usability
Functional utility, complexity comfort, and AI orchestration readiness.
Grade: A+Signals: 1
94%
Complexity Comfort
Agent comfort level based on API operational and structural complexity.
50
Security
Trust, risk posture, and security compliance.
Grade: C-Signals: 1
50%
Authentication Strength
Average quality of security schemes based on authentication method strength (weakest link for OAuth2).
100
AI Discoverability
Findability, semantic richness, and reasoning readiness.
Grade: A+Signals: 1
100%
Descriptive Richness
Clarity and depth of descriptions across API elements.
Score it yourself
Every API in the directory is allowlisted, so you can re-score it with no key required.
npx @jentic/api-scorecard-cli score <openapi-url>Why Jentic?
What agents get from Jentic-routed access to this vendor.
Setup
Wiring the NCI Syndication API by hand means setting its X-API-KEY header and learning the separate trials, drug dictionary, glossary, and search routes yourself. Through Jentic you install once, import the NCI Syndication API from the API Directory, store the key once, and your agent calls it.
Permission scoping
This API exposes read-only search and lookup routes, with ids like /trials/{nci_id} in the URL path, so scope the agent to the operations it needs, such as trial search and drug lookups. You choose the operations it may call, so it stays limited to the read routes you enable.
Credential isolation
Your NCI API key is stored once, encrypted, by your own Jentic One instance and injected into the X-API-KEY header at execution time. It never enters the agent's prompt, logs, or context.
Intent-based discovery
Agents search Jentic by intent such as 'find cancer clinical trials' or 'look up a cancer drug', and Jentic returns the matching NCI operation with its input schema so the agent calls the right endpoint without browsing the reference docs.
Related APIs
Alternatives and complements available in the Jentic catalogue.
FAQs
Specific to using NCI Syndication API through Jentic.
Why is there no official OpenAPI spec for NCI Syndication API?
The National Cancer Institute documents its syndication services individually but does not publish a consolidated OpenAPI specification. Jentic generates and maintains this spec so that AI agents and developers can call NCI Syndication API via structured tooling. It is validated against the live API and kept up to date. Get started with Jentic One, the self-hosted execution layer.
What authentication does the NCI Syndication API use?
It uses an API key passed in the X-API-KEY header. Through Jentic, the key is stored in your Jentic One instance and injected into the X-API-KEY header at execution time, so the raw key never enters the agent's prompt context.
Can I search for clinical trials by disease and location?
Yes. GET /trials accepts disease, location, recruitment_status, age, and phase filters and returns matching trials. Use the returned NCI ID with GET /trials/{nci_id} to retrieve the full record including eligibility criteria.
How do I look up a cancer drug through Jentic?
Search 'look up a cancer drug' through the Jentic SDK. Jentic returns GET /drugdictionary/v1/Drugs with its input schema. Provide a name or partial-match term and execute the operation to retrieve drug records with aliases and indications.
Are there separate hosts for clinical trials versus other services?
Yes. Clinical-trial endpoints live on https://clinicaltrialsapi.cancer.gov/api/v2 and the other syndication services live on https://webapis.cancer.gov. Both servers are listed in the OpenAPI spec; pick the one matching the operation's path.
Is the NCI Syndication API free?
Yes. NCI provides the API free of charge with an API key obtained through the cancer.gov developer portal. Honour any rate limits or terms of use noted in your key registration.
Can I limit what my agent is allowed to do with the NCI Syndication API?
Yes. Because you run your own self-hosted Jentic One instance, your rules decide which operations and credentials the agent may use. This API exposes only read-only search and lookup routes, so you can enable just the ones the agent needs, such as GET /trials and GET /trials/{nci_id} for clinical-trial search or GET /drugdictionary/v1/Drugs and GET /glossary/v1/Terms for drug and term lookups, while withholding the rest. The agent stays limited to the read operations you turn on and cannot call anything you have not enabled.
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