Introduction:

In 2018, central nervous system tumors represented approximately 1.4% of new cancer diagnoses, causing 2.6% of deaths by cancer. In Colombia, there are few reports on the epidemiology of brain tumors, and those that exist are from local databases that don´t have a rigorous and massive registry.

Aim:

To determine the survival rates of brain tumors in Colombia.

Methods:

A retrospective descriptive observational study was conducted, using databases of population-based cancer registries in Colombia. We extracted information from 2003-2012 of patients with tumors without age group restriction. The survival rates were calculated, using the Kaplan-Meier method and the statistical software Stata 14.0.

Results

From 2003-2012, 775 adult patients and 123 pediatric patients were reported with a new central nervous system tumor diagnosis in the four cities. The most frequent tumors in the pediatric age group were neuroepithelial tumors, embryonal tumors and ependymal tumors; whereas for adults, the most frequent were neuroepithelial tumors, meningiomas and hematolymphoid tumors. The global survival rate at 6 months, 1 year, 2 years and 3 years, were approximately 49.9%, 35.2%, 21.4% and 15.3% in the pediatric population, and 70.2%, 58.9%, 43.3% and 35.4% in the adult population.

Conclusions

The present work constitutes the most recent and multicentric study on the epidemiology of brain tumors in Colombia. There was a clear underreport of this type of tumor and inferior rates compared to universal literature. Despite this, these results will help to widen data recollection and coverage in population-based cancer registries.

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