Pattern of tumors in children admitted to Children Welfare Hospital

The objective of this study was to estimate trends of disease during a twenty years period when Iraq underwent three destructive wars and economic sanctions and to study their relation to other demographic criteria and outcome of malignancy in term of survival or death. All types of childhood malignancy were studied except brain tumors that treated at the Neurosurgical Hospital. This cross-sectional study was based on a review of case records of patients admitted to Children Welfare Hospital in Baghdad over a twenty year period starting from first of January 1985 to the thirty first of December 2004. Malignancies were classified according to the international classification of disease for oncology. The second year interval (90-94) of the study witnessed three fold increases in number of malignancy, while third of cases were reported in the last interval (2000-2004). The year 2002 showed most frequent cases (7.5%). Leukemia was the commonest malignancy accounting for 59.7%, lymphomas were the second commonest malignancy forming 22%.