Published in:
Open Access 01-12-2009 | Research
Incidence of breast cancer in Italy: mastectomies and quadrantectomies performed between 2000 and 2005
Published in: Journal of Experimental & Clinical Cancer Research | Issue 1/2009
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Objectives
We aimed to determine the incidence of women's breast cancer in Italy without using statistical approximations.
Methods
We analyzed the national hospitalizations database at the Ministry of Health to calculate the number of major surgeries in Italian women (mastectomies and quadrantectomies) due to breast cancer between 2000 and 2005, overall and by age groups (<44, 45–64, 65–74 and ≥ 75 years old).
Results
Over the six years examined, an overall number of 100,745 mastectomies and 168,147 quadrantectomies were performed. A total of 41,608 major surgeries due to breast cancer were performed in the year 2000 and this number rose to 47,200 in 2005, with a 13.4% increase over six years.
Conclusion
by analyzing the hospitalizations database concerning major breast surgery, incidence of breast cancer in Italy was found to be 26.5% higher than the official estimations which have been computed using statistical models (namely 47,200 vs. 37,300 cases in year 2005).