Using the Capture-Recapture Method to Estimate the Incidence of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis in Beijing, China

Abstract

Background: To assess the total, gender-related and ageing process-related incidence rates of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in Beijing, China. Determine whether the decreased male to female ratio among postmenopausal age groups. Methods: We used the 2-source capture-recapture method to estimate the incidence of ALS in Beijing. The primary and secondary data sources were from diagnostic hospitals and assisted care institutions in the same area from 2010 to 2015. Results: A total of 562 cases and 283 cases were extracted from 2 data sources, and a total of 962 patients diagnosed with ALS within the 6-year period were estimated (95% CI 883–1041). The average yearly incidence was 0.77/100,000 persons (95% CI 0.71–0.83). The female to male ratio was 1.63. The incidence was associated with age and peaked in the 55–64 year age group. There was no obvious decline in the male:female ratio among postmenopausal age groups. Conclusions: The total incidence of ALS in Beijing is similar to international reports. The onset of ALS is not merely the result of ageing.

Incidence and prevalence of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis in urban China: a national population-based study

“…This finding indicates that the incidence and prevalence are similar across countries in East Asia, and are independent of the Sociodemographic Index (SDI), consistent with the meta-analysis of the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016 2. The prevalence of ALS in our study was comparable with the findings from Hong Kong and Taiwan, but the incidence seemed to be higher than in these two regions and than that reported in two studies in mainland China 5 8 10 11. Our large national sample size and standardised rate calculation methodology ensured relatively stable and new results10 11 28; these results indicated that the actual number of incident patients with ALS in Asia was still higher than that in Western populations given the large population.…”

“…The prevalence of ALS in our study was comparable with the findings from Hong Kong and Taiwan, but the incidence seemed to be higher than in these two regions and than that reported in two studies in mainland China 5 8 10 11. Our large national sample size and standardised rate calculation methodology ensured relatively stable and new results10 11 28; these results indicated that the actual number of incident patients with ALS in Asia was still higher than that in Western populations given the large population. In addition, men were more likely to have ALS than females, with a 1.4-fold increased risk, a finding consistent with previous studies in Asian and other races 1 7 29–31…”

“…Both rates, especially the incidence rate, were much lower in Hong Kong and Taiwan than in Japan and South Korea 1 2. For mainland China, only two hospital-based studies have been performed 10 11. These existing studies were limited to only a single city, or calculated the rates with a rough capture–recapture method, or used inconsistent definitions of ALS 10 11.…”

“…For mainland China, only two hospital-based studies have been performed 10 11. These existing studies were limited to only a single city, or calculated the rates with a rough capture–recapture method, or used inconsistent definitions of ALS 10 11. In addition, no further epidemiological studies are available to estimate the rates among different sexes, age groups and geographical regions in mainland China, which is of importance to inform policy making with respect to ALS management in China.…”

Prevalence of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis in the United States using established and novel methodologies, 2017

“…Capture–recapture is a widely used statistical technique that examines the overlap in identification of cases from data sources and uses this information to estimate the number of cases who were not identified by any of the sources, thus enabling a conclusion about the completeness of ascertainment ( 27 ). Capture–recapture method has also been used by other studies across different race and ethnic background to correct for the missing cases in the estimations of incidence rates ( 28 – 30 ). For the purposes of estimating the degree of under-ascertainment by the Registry data source, Nelson et al applied capture–recapture methods to the 15,927 cases identified by the three data sources during the registry year 2014 ( 31 ).…”