The Incidence of Breast Cancer in Iranian Women and Men; a systematic review and meta-analysis

Introduction & Aim: Different types of cancer vary in incidence by more than an order of magnitude between different populations. Also epidemiologic basic data is very important for designing and implementation of screening programs in every country. This systematic review was done to provide an overview about incidence, geographical and age distribution of breast cancers in Iran. Methods: A comprehensive search were done according to MOOSE guideline criteria in national and international databases for selecting eligible articles from 2005 to 2015. After screening titles and abstracts, duplicated and irrelevant studies were excluded. Selected papers are written in Persian or English. The standard error of the cancer incidence was calculated based on the binomial distribution. Because of the significant heterogeneity observed among the results, we used a random-effects model combine the results of the primary studies. Moreover, a sensitivity analysis was undertaken to explore the effects of the risk of bias and other sources of heterogeneity.Results: Overall 9 articles met eligibility criteria for inclusion. The total incidence of breast cancer was 8.7 per 100,000 and 2.2 per hundred thousand of people in females and males respectively. The highest incidence rate was seen in Golestan Province (26.43 per 100,000) and in the age group over 65 years. Conclusion: Given to high incidence of breast cancer in Iranian population, development and accomplish of universal public cancer control program should be the first priority for health policy makers.