Pediatric neurological cancer incidence and trends in the United States, 2000–2018

Objective To characterize the epidemiological trends and sociodemographic variation of pediatric and adolescent neurological cancers by histological subtypes over time in the USA. Methods A total of 16,511 patients aged 0–19 years diagnosed with neurological cancers between 2000 and 2018, including 13,024 with central nervous system (CNS) neoplasms and 3,487 with neuroblastomas, were identified from 18 registries of the National Cancer Institute’s Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results Program. Incidence trends over time and incidence rate ratios by race/ethnicity, sex, and age were calculated for histological subtype. Age-standardized incidence rates (ASIR) by year of diagnosis and average annual percent changes (AAPC) were calculated to measure incidence rates. ASIR by race/ethnicity, sex, and age were calculated to examine the incidence variation by these factors. Results Overall, age-standardized annual incidence per 100,000 person-years increased from 2.20 in 2000 to 3.21 in 2018 with an AAPC of 1.4% (95% confidence interval or CI: 0.5% to 2.4%); however, that of Hispanic decreased from 2.93 in 2000 to 2.59 in 2018 with an AAPC of − 0.8% (95% CI: − 1.2% to − 0.3%). Non-Hispanic Black children and adolescents had a statistically significantly lower incidence than non-Hispanic White peers both for CNS neoplasms (incidence rate ratio or IRR: 0.67; 95% CI: 0.63 to 0.71) and neuroblastomas (IRR: 0.75; 95% CI: 0.68 to 0.83). Females generally had a lower incidence than males, especially among those with intracranial and intraspinal embryonal tumors (IRR: 0.69; 95% CI: 0.64 to 0.75). The highest incidence rate of neuroblastoma was among newborns aged less than 1 year, and the highest incidence rate of CNS neoplasms was among children aged 1–4 years. Conclusion The incidence of neurological cancers has increased among children and adolescents from 2000 to 2018, with wide variation across demographic groups.