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Incidence

Last reviewed dd mmm yyyy. Last edited dd mmm yyyy

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The incidence of brain tumours is 5-15 per 100,000 per year and they account for about 2% of deaths

  • they represent an increasing source of mortality in both sexes, especially in the 70-74 age group - this trend cannot be explained entirely by the improved techniques for investigating intracranial disease.

Brain tumours may be histologically malignant but rarely metastasise outside the brain

  • about 20% are secondary metastases - most commonly, lung then breast and kidney
  • of the primaries, the majority are gliomas (43%), followed by meningiomas (10%), and pituitary adenomas (10%). Others are comparatively rare.

Their incidence shows two age peaks - in children, and in late middle age

  • in children, astrocytomas and medulloblastomas are the dominant cerebral tumours whilst in adults, gliomas, meningiomas and metastases are the most common
    • CNS tumours presenting in the young differ notably from those in older adults in terms of the cellular origins, pathological subtypes and anatomic site
      • most common subtypes in young people are astrocytic tumours (50%) and embryonal tumours including medulloblastoma (25%)
  • tumours of the central nervous system (CNS) are the second most common group of childhood cancers comprising a quarter of all malignancies in patients aged 0-14 years with approximately 350 children diagnosed each year in the UK
    • CNS tumours also represent a major diagnostic group in teenagers and young adults aged 15-24 years with around 150 new cases per year diagnosed in the UK representing 10% of all cancers in this age range

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