Demo-geographical data of myelodysplastic syndrome based on a large sample of patients from a Romanian Hematological...

To present some retrospective data on the epidemiology of myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) in Romania, in a large but well-defined territory and over a long period of time, as reflected by a large single-hospital based Registry.

The registration forms provided by the MDS Foundation were filled in with the data of the new adult primary MDS patients admitted in the Hematological Department of Fundeni Clinical Institute, Bucharest, during 1985-2004 and classified according to French-American-British (FAB) criteria.

The study comprised 306 patients accrued from a delimited geo-administrative zone, 137 (45%) from Bucharest and 169 (55%) from the rest of the region. The results revealed male predominance, obvious increase of the crude and ≥60 years age group specific incidence temporal trend, nonnegligible proportion of the <50 years age group, similar distribution and temporal trend of both rural/urban areas and gender in all included counties, and no geographical and familial clustering.

The increase of the MDS incidence in Romania appears not to be related to the ageing of the population but rather to: 1) the increasing addressability to health care of the elderly; 2) the greater awareness of the physicians on MDS; 3) the expansion of the hematological laboratories network; 4) the increasing number of hematologists and oncologists. The methodology used in this work, using a comprehensive analysis of the standard population, can allow a better comparison of the different MDS Registries of an European or regional network and of the data of the same Registry from different time intervals.