Onkológia 6/2021
Comprehensive analysis of selected epidemiological indicators of lung cancer in the Slovak Republic in an interactive online environment
Background: Lung cancer is the most common malignancy in men worldwide, whereas in women it occurs in third place, after breast and colorectal cancer. Updated epidemiological indicators for this disease come to the forefront of the professional public not only for high lethality and poor overall survival of patients with this disease, but also for the new results of studies on the positive impact of screening examinations in a defined population of smokers. Objective: Interactive visualization of combined data 1. on epidemiological indicators of lung cancer in the Slovak Republic, 2. from reported health care by health insurance companies in local conditions and 3. from data from real clinical practice obtained through a non-interventional cross-sectional study in the Slovak Republic aims to make available to the professional public otherwise unavailable information about target population of patients with lung cancer in one place without the need for a demanding search for methodology or even the data themselves. Material and methodology: The data for the epidemiological part of the publication were taken from the outputs of National Cancer Registry of the SR and from the Statistical Office of the SR. The data on the reported health care were provided from the National Health Information Center on the basis of a request for information. The data for the implementation of an epidemiological retrospective descriptive study were obtained by exhausting collecting of the results of defined examinations in all patients with histologically newly diagnosed primary lung cancer at 5 selected pathology departments in the Slovak Republic. Results: By interactively displaying of the results of analyzes in the online environment of the MS Power BI web browser, the user of visualization can make any change in filters, in the range of monitored years or combinations of selected parameters, which is then reflected by automatic recalculation of displayed descriptive statistics and graphical visualizations. The results can be freely operatively changed, layered, combined and even exported according to the user’s personal preferences. The condition for using the application is a stable internet connection, a recommended internet browser and access to the given report. Any newly discovered changes in local conditions are incorporated and immediately available. Conclusion: The presented form of processing epidemiological indicators in lung cancer in the Slovak Republic presents a comprehensive analysis of arbitrarily selectable combinations of detailed morphological types, selected immunohistochemical and genetic tests (e.g., EGFR, ALK, ROS1), as well as all exhaustive descriptive epidemiological indicators of the studied cohort of patients (age, geographical distribution, gender, time sessions of examinations, etc.).
Keywords: lung cancer, incidence, prevalence, clinical stages, genetics, immunohistochemistry, cost
