Profile of pediatric tumors: A 10-year study at a tertiary care center in North India

Objective: The objective of this study was to find the profile of childhood cancers in the Sher-I-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences (SKIMS), Srinagar, India, from 2010 to 2019. Materials and Methods: It was a retrospective study where medical records of children with cancer that was registered in regional cancer center SKIMS, Srinagar, from January 2010 to December 2019, aged 0–14 years diagnosed using histological or cytological examinations were reviewed to gather data on the prevalence and pattern of tumors according to age, sex, and rural and urban distribution. Results: There were 38,962 new confirmed cases registered in the regional cancer center at SKIMS, Srinagar, during these 10 years. Among which 1036 were below 15 years of age. An average of 103 cases attended per year. Overall pediatric tumors were 2.66% of total cancers. The frequency of cancer was found to be higher among boys (57.9%) than girls (42.1%) with a ratio of 1.37:1. The majority of the children were from rural areas (84.9%) compared to (15.1%) from urban areas. The results showed that leukemia (36.6%), lymphoma (19.8%), and bone tumors (9.3%) were the commonly found childhood cancers among the children attended at SKIMS, Srinagar, during these 10 years. Other less commonly found tumors were central nervous system tumors (6.7%), Wilms' tumor (4.1%), retinoblastoma (3.7%), and cancer of unknown primary with secondaries (1.5%). Conclusions: Leukemia, lymphoma, and bone tumors were the most common malignancies reported in the children treated at our cancer center.