Incidence and Trends of Malignant and Benign Pancreatic Lesions in Yazd, Iran between 2001 and 2011

Background: Despite recent valuable steps in initiating a cancer registry in Iran, data depicting prevalence,incidence, and clinical picture of pancreatic tumors in the country are exceedinglyly sparse. With the aim offilling this knowledge gap, we reviewed cases in the pathology archive of Shahid Sadoughi hospital (Yazd, Iran),between 2001 and 2011. Materials and
Methods: Medical records of 177 patients are reported in the present study.In cases for which paraffin-embedded blocks were available, the specimens were evaluated by two independentpathologists blinded to the primary diagnosis. We extrapolated the frequency of malignant lesions in our studyto the population of Yazd province, derived from national census data, to generate cancer incidence rates.
Results: Final diagnosis of malignancy was made in 117 cases (66.1%), and the remainder (60 lesions, 33.9%)were classified as benign. Adenecarcinoma and neuroendocrine tumors were the two most common histologicaltypes of malignancy identified in 88 (75.2%) and 11 (9.4%) specimens, respectively. Crude annual incidence ofpancreatic cancer was 0.55 per 100,000 person in 2001 and increased to 1.68 in 2011. Age standardized incidencerates in 2001 and 2011 were 0.75 and 2.68, respectively. A significant increasing trend in cancer incidence wasobserved during the 11 years of the study period (r =+0.856, p=0.009). Sex-stratified analysis, confirmed theobserved trend in men (r=+0.728, p=0.034), but not women (r=+0.635, p=0.083).
Conclusions: Over the pastdecade, incidence of pancreas malignancies has risen steadily in Yazd, Iran. Nevertheless, these figures are stillsubstantially lower than those prevalent in developed nations.