Incidence of Gastrointestinal Cancers in Iran: A Systematic Review

Context: In service planning, indicators such as incidence can aid the development of strategies for service provision. The current systematic review was carried out to provide a general viewpoint on incidence, geographical and age distribution of gastrointestinal (GI) cancers in Iran.
Evidence Acquisition: A detailed Science Direct, PubMed, Scopus, Google Scholar, Iran Medex, Magiran and SID (scientific information databases) search was made from 2005 to 2015. The basic inclusion criteria were all relevant studies focused on GI cancers incidence and epidemiologic data from Iran.
Overall incidence of cancer was 19.4 and 17.2 per 100 000 in males and females, respectively. The three most common GI cancers in males were: esophagus, stomach and colorectal and in females: colorectal, stomach and esophagus. The highest incidence rate was observed in Golestan province and in the age group over 65 years.
According to increasing incidence rate of GI cancers in Iran, development, establishment and implement of comprehensive national cancer control program should be the first priorities for health policy makers.