A study on basic demographic and disease characteristics of cancer-diagnosed Syrian refugees treated in the border city of Turkey, Sanliurfa; a hospital-based retrospective case series study.

PURPOSE: Turkey hosts around 3 million Syrian refugees which is more than any other country in the world. Along with some other adaptation issues like cultural, language, and economic difficulties, significant problems in managing medical problems, chronic diseases like cancer in particular, have to be fixed. However, there are few studies which explore main patient and clinicopathological characteristics in Syrian refugees with cancer. The purpose of this study was to highlight the aforementioned characteristics along with management issues after cancer diagnosis of these patients.
METHODS: This study was designed as a hospital-based retrospective observational case-series study of 134 Syrian refugees cancer patients between 2015 and 2017.
RESULTS: The patient median age was 47.5 years (range 18- 80). Out of the 134, 102 (76.1%) were female. The most common cancer types were breast (n=57, 42.5%) and gynecological cancers (n=14, 10.4%). The majority of patients were diagnosed at advanced stage (n=60, 44.8%). There were 91 (67.9%) and 43 (32.1%) patients admitted to our center from refugee camps and staying in a house, respectively. The median follow-up was 14 months (range 1-111) and 11 (8.2%) patients died. One and two-year survival rate of the whole group were 93% and 86%, respectively. There were 12 (9%) patients with grade 3-4 hematological and non-hematological toxicities. Neutropenia was the most common grade 3-4 toxicity (n=8, 6%). The patients staying in refugee camp (n-91) or in a house (n=43) finished all planned cycles of chemotherapy with a rate of 71% (n=65) and 79% (n=34), respectively. Statistical analysis failed to show significant relationship between the staying site (either camp or house), chemotherapy compliance rate, grade 3-4 toxicities with p=0.347 and p=0.09, respectively.
CONCLUSION: Our results revealed that breast cancer and gynecological cancers were the most common cancer types which are good candidates for cancer screening. Unfortunately, the majority of patients had cancer diagnosed at advanced stage. However, after diagnosis they could reach all health facilities including surgical operation, radiotherapy, and systemic chemotherapy similar to Turkish cancer patients. Therefore, our results suggested that major problem for the Syrian refugees adapting them into national screening program which may resulted that cancer diagnosis at earlier stage with high cure rate.