Under-diagnosis and under-ascertainment of cases may be the reasons for low childhood cancer incidence in rural India

Cancer statistics from India revealed that childhood cancer incidence is lesser in rural than urban India. This might be due to under-diagnosis or under-ascertainment of cases or could even be true. With registries able to explicitly measure and appropriately streamline the ascertainment of cases to comply with acceptable standards, it is under-diagnosis that is variable and highly influenced by development of or accessibility to specialized centres in or around the registry area. This is reflected implicitly by marked variation in incidence between different populations in India: weighted age standardized rates of all childhood cancers together was the highest (108 per million) in metropolitan areas, followed by other urban (86) and rural (53) areas in that order. A childhood cancer registry focusing on pertinent data collection and specific epidemiological studies is desirable to explain the variations in incidence and outcome of childhood cancers in India.