SummaryBackgroundGlobal inequalities in access to health care are reflected in differences in cancer survival. The CONCORD programme was designed to assess worldwide differences and trends in population-based cancer survival. In this population-based study, we aimed to estimate survival inequalities globally for several subtypes of childhood leukaemia.MethodsCancer registries participating in CONCORD were asked to submit tumour registrations for all children aged 0–14 years who were diagnosed with leukaemia between Jan 1, 1995, and Dec 31, 2009, and followed up until Dec 31, 2009. Haematological malignancies were defined by morphology codes in the International Classification of Diseases for Oncology, third revision. We excluded data from registries from which the data were judged to be less reliable, or included only lymphomas, and data from countries in which data for fewer than ten children were available for analysis. We also excluded records because of a missing date of birth, diagnosis, or last known vital status. We estimated 5-year net survival (ie, the probability of surviving at least 5 years after diagnosis, after controlling for deaths from other causes [background mortality]) for children by calendar period of diagnosis (1995–99, 2000–04, and 2005–09), sex, and age at diagnosis (<1, 1–4, 5–9, and 10–14 years, inclusive) using appropriate life tables. We estimated age-standardised net survival for international comparison of survival trends for precursor-cell acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) and acute myeloid leukaemia (AML).FindingsWe analysed data from 89 828 children from 198 registries in 53 countries. During 1995–99, 5-year age-standardised net survival for all lymphoid leukaemias combined ranged from 10·6% (95% CI 3·1–18·2) in the Chinese registries to 86·8% (81·6–92·0) in Austria. International differences in 5-year survival for childhood leukaemia were still large as recently as 2005–09, when age-standardised survival for lymphoid leukaemias ranged from 52·4% (95% CI 42·8–61·9) in Cali, Colombia, to 91·6% (89·5–93·6) in the German registries, and for AML ranged from 33·3% (18·9–47·7) in Bulgaria to 78·2% (72·0–84·3) in German registries. Survival from precursor-cell ALL was very close to that of all lymphoid leukaemias combined, with similar variation. In most countries, survival from AML improved more than survival from ALL between 2000–04 and 2005–09. Survival for each type of leukaemia varied markedly with age: survival was highest for children aged 1–4 and 5–9 years, and lowest for infants (younger than 1 year). There was no systematic difference in survival between boys and girls.InterpretationGlobal inequalities in survival from childhood leukaemia have narrowed with time but remain very wide for both ALL and AML. These results provide useful information for health policy makers on the effectiveness of health-care systems and for cancer policy makers to reduce inequalities in childhood cancer survival.FundingCanadian Partnership Against Cancer, Cancer Focus Northern Ireland, Cancer In...

The information provided by MRI can define prognosis, help planning the surgical approach and identify those patients requiring neoadjuvant chemotherapy or radiation therapy.

Patients who are at the high-risk for the development of synchronous primary tumors in the cancers of the head and neck region are patients with oropharyngeal carcinoma, smoking population, patients over the age of 62 years in males, and 57 years in females and in patients with higher staged index tumor.

Endoscopy can be rationally used during the pre-therapeutic work-up of patients with a history of smoking and/or in patients over the age of 62 years. Instead of complete upper gastro intestinal endoscopy up to the second part of duodenum, only esophagoscopy is needed for the detection of synchronous primary of upper aero-digestive tract in cancers of the head and neck region.

Background:The incidence of gall bladder cancers in this part of the world is high and the spatial variation in occurrence of gall bladder cancers can be identified by using geographical information system.Materials and Methods:Data set containing the address information of gall bladder cancer patients from the District of Kamrup, India was obtained from cancer registry of a regional cancer center. The data set consisted of patients registered during the period of January 2010 to December 2012. The ArcGIS 10.0 used for the present analysis and the population density map of the District was prepared by using LandScan, 2008™.Results:There were isolated areas with very high density of cases and low population density termed as “hot spots”. Alternatively there were areas with very high population density and lesser number of cases with gall bladder cancers.Conclusion:This type of an analysis using GIS provides evidence to conduct joint research by epidemiologists and specialists from environmental and geological sciences in tandem.

Women's health issues have attained high concern in recent decades. Utmost efforts should be made to educate women in early cancer detection by creating awareness on risk factors and symptoms.

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Background: Epithelial ovarian cancer usually presents at an advanced stage and neoadjuvant chemotherapy followed by interval cytoreduction is a standard treatment procedure. Visual intraoperative impression of the extent of the disease, total disease burden and resection status at the end of the cytoreductive surgery are important prognostic factors. Systematic documentation of the operative findings forms the cornerstone of an oncology center. Methods: A prospective observational study was carried out to carry out intra-operative mapping of ovarian cancer at the time of interval cytoreduction after a course of 3-4 cycles of neo-adjuvant chemotherapy. Results: 110 patients were included in the study. Profile of the patient were documented in the study along with the operative findings. It has evolved as a clinical and surgical audit of our center. Maximum tumour burden was evident in omentum (37.2%), followed by ovaries (11.8%) and deposits in pouch of douglas (7.2%). Notably, in 64.5% cases there was complete resection followed by R1 (residual disease status up to 1 cm) in 22.7% cases and R2 (residual disease status more than 1 cm) in 12.7% cases. In 43.6% there was complete remission of the disease with no evidence of the disease on histopathological examination.