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Use of administrative health databases to estimate incidence and prevalence of acromegaly in Piedmont Region, Italy

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Abstract

Purpose

Recent studies from national registries have described changing patterns in epidemiology of acromegaly. Our retrospective study used administrative databases to estimate prevalence and incidence of acromegaly in the Piedmont Region, Italy.

Methods

This study was conducted in Piedmont between 2012 and 2016 on administrative health databases for inpatients and outpatients of any age. Enrollees were included if claims suggestive of acromegaly were identified in at least two of the following databases: Drug Claims Registry, Hospital Information System, Co-payment Exemption Registry and Outpatient Specialist Service Information System.

Results

369 individuals (M = 146, F = 223) met our criteria. Overall incidence was 5.3 per million person years (95% CI 4.2–6.7), and prevalence was 83 cases per million inhabitants (95% CI 75–92). Mean age was 50.9 years. Both incidence and prevalence were slightly higher among women (rate ratio 1.08, prevalence ratio 1.43). Age-specific incidence was similar between sexes up to 39 years and diverged thereafter, with an increasing trend recorded among men. Prevalence was higher in women aged 40–79 years, and increased continuously up to 79 years in both sexes.

Conclusions

This is the first population-based study conducted in Italy to estimate incidence and prevalence of acromegaly and results show a higher prevalence than previously reported. Although our algorithm requires proper validation, it constitutes a promising tool to describe the epidemiology of acromegaly.

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Funding

This work was supported by PRIN (Progetti di ricerca di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale) 2015 (2015ZHKFTA_001).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Endocrinology, Department of Translational Medicine, Università del Piemonte Orientale, Novara, Italy

    M. Caputo, C. Mele, L. De Marchi, P. Marzullo & G. Aimaretti

  2. Department of Translational Medicine, Università del Piemonte Orientale, Novara, Italy

    A. Ucciero, C. Magnani & T. Cena

  3. Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Università del Piemonte Orientale, Novara, Italy

    F. Barone-Adesi

Authors
  1. M. Caputo
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  2. A. Ucciero
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  3. C. Mele
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  9. G. Aimaretti
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to G. Aimaretti.

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Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in this study were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. The study protocol was approved by the local ethical committee of the “Maggiore della Carità” Hospital, Novara (CE 58/18).

Informed consent

The study was performed using data routinely collected in the regional administrative health care databases and the authors had access only to anonymized data, so for this type of study informed consent was not required.

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Caputo, M., Ucciero, A., Mele, C. et al. Use of administrative health databases to estimate incidence and prevalence of acromegaly in Piedmont Region, Italy. J Endocrinol Invest 42, 397–402 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40618-018-0928-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40618-018-0928-7

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