PREVALENCE ASSESSMENT OF COLORECTAL AND B REAST CANCERS IN THE RHONE-ALPES AREA

Prevalence of malignant neoplasm is a basic health indicator used in o rder to evaluate needs in medical equipments for treatment and follow- up of cancer patients. Data on prevalence are regularly published by N orthern European countries Thames and Connecticut cancer registries. I n France available information on prevalence are scanty, because follo w-up of cancer patients is not easy. Therefore, we used a statistical method to evaluate prevalence from incidence and mortality in the Rhon e-Alpes area (France, 5,300,000 inhabitants) in 1990, using the depart ment of Isere population based registry. For females, figures for brea st carcinoma and colorectal carcinoma are respectively 25,000 and 5,70 0, and for males, 5,700 colorectal carcinoma For 5 year partial preval ance, these figures are respectively 11,300, 3,100 and 3,500. The rati o prevalence/incidence is 8.9 for breast in females, 5.8 for colorecta l carcinoma in females and 4.8 for colorectal carcinoma in males with a steep decrease for 5 year partial prevalence (4 for breast carcinoma 3.1 for females colorectal carcinoma and 2.9 for males colorectal car cinoma). These ratios are consistent with those observed elsewhere in Europe.