Abstract
Abstract: :
Purpose: A major portion of all patients with ocular/orbital tumors in Kenya are referred to the University eye clinic of Nairobi. Since no alternative treatment such as brachytherapy or external beam radiation exists in Kenya, enucleation/exenteration is the only possible therapeutic option. Methods: All enucleated/exenterated surgical specimen of orbital/ocular malignancies seen in one year (Nov. 2000 - Nov. 2001) were histologically evaluated and included in this study. The crude incidence rate (CIR) for Retinoblastoma (RB) and Rhabdomyosarcoma (RM) in Kenya was calculated using the 1999 demographic data of Kenya. We evaluated following characteristics of the patients with these malignancies: tumor incidence, age, and sex of the patients. For statistical analysis the Mann-Whitney test was used. Results: This study consisted of 75 patients with malignant ocular/orbital tumors. Thirty-one were female, 44 were male. Mean age of the patients was 9.6 years. The most common tumor was RB (69.3% (52), mean age 2.7 years.) followed by conjunctival squamous cell carcinoma (CSCC, 9.3% (7), mean age 46.3 years.), and RM (8.0% (6), mean age 7.8 years). All patients with CSCC had a positive serology for HIV. The remaining ocular/orbital malignanciesn comprised 13.3% with a mean age of 17 years (1 malignant orbital Teratoma, 1 pituitary gland tumor spreading into the orbit, 2 lid carcinomas, involving the orbit, 2 pleomorphic adenomas, 1 optic nerve glioma, and 1 orbital meningioma). Bilateral RB was present in 10 children (19.2% of all RB; 2 female, 8 male patients). The age of the patients with bilateral RB was not significantly different (p ≷ 0,05) as compared to unilateral RB. CIR for RB and RM in children under 14 years of age in Kenya is 0,43 for RB (1 per 17063 live births) and 0,05 for RM (1 per 150987/year). Conclusion: The most common ocular/orbital tumors in Kenya are RB followed by conjunctival squamous cell carcinoma and RM. We found a similar incidence of Retinoblastoma and Rhabdomyosarcoma as compared to other studies performed in other countries.
Keywords: 569 retinoblastoma • 496 oncology • 501 orbit