Comprehensive analysis of Iranian reports of pediatric central nervous system tumors

Abstract

Purpose Iran lacks a national registry reporting the data of central nervous system (CNS) tumors in children. Consequently, treatment success and failure rates are unknown, and a centralized system for disease-management recommendations does not exist. Methods To critically evaluate the current state of pediatric CNS tumor studies and reporting in Iran, we performed an extensive retrospective analysis of all known reports identified with multiple search engines. Results Of 409 initially retrieved articles, we evaluated 123 matching our inclusion criteria. We further narrowed these reports to 74 by excluding studies pertaining to adult patients only, non-CNS tumors, or brain metastases. We also excluded studies that were performed outside of Iran or that did not contain relevant data from our analysis. We divided the remaining studies into those describing exclusively pediatric patients (3,484 patients) and those describing mixed populations of adults and children (18,641 patients). In total, our analysis included 22,125 patients. Conclusions We identified many limitations in the reporting of studies describing the treatment or prevalence of CNS tumors in children in Iran. Our results may guide future efforts in Iran to improve the care for children with CNS tumors and may provide a valuable template for other comprehensive country- and disease-specific retrospective analyses.

Descriptive Epidemiology of Brain and Central Nervous System Tumours: Results from Iran National Cancer Registry, 2010-2014

“…Our findings on the histology of tumours are not possibly conclusive enough due to notably high rates of unspecified tumours (mostly M 8000.3 and M 8001.3 codes), which are likely a reflection of lack of advanced diagnostic facilities particularly in rural areas that indicates high rates of astrocytic and oligodendroglia tumours. These findings are in line with previous studies conducted in Iran [ 22 , 25 , 27 ]. Lack of a unanimous tumour diagnosis even by skillful pathologists is another reason behind the high rates of unspecified tumours.…”

Frequency of Pediatric Brain Tumors in Tertiary Care Institute of Pakistan and Comparison With International Data

“…This includes a meta-analysis done by Rickert et al, and same pattern has been observed in other papers 16 . However, some local studies place ependymoma as the fourth most common tumor subtype 17,18 .…”