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Epidemiology of acromegaly in Italy: analysis from a large longitudinal primary care database

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Abstract

Purpose

Epidemiological data are pivotal for the estimation of disease burden in populations.

Aim

Of the study was to estimate the incidence and prevalence of acromegaly in Italy along with the impact of comorbidities and hospitalization rates as compared to the general population.

Methods

Retrospective epidemiological study (from 2000 to 2014) and case control-study. Data were extracted from the Health Search Database (HSD). HSD contains patient records from about 1000 general practitioners (GPs) throughout Italy, covering a population of more than 1 million patients. It includes information about patient demographics and medical data including clinical diagnoses and diagnostic tests.

Results

At the end of the study period, 74 acromegaly patients (out of 1,066,871 people) were identified, resulting in a prevalence of 6.9 per 100,000 inhabitants [95% CI 5.4–8.5]. Prevalence was higher in females than men (p = 0.004), and showed a statistically significant trend of increase over time (p < 0.0001). Overall, incidence during the study period was 0.31 per 100,000 person-years. Hypertension and type II diabetes mellitus were the comorbidities more frequently associated with acromegaly (31.3 and 14.6%, respectively) and patients were more likely to undergo a high frequency of yearly hospitalization (≥3 accesses/year, p < 0.001) compared to sex-age matched controls.

Conclusions

This epidemiological study on acromegaly carried out using a large GP-based database, documented a disease prevalence of about 7 cases per 100,000 inhabitants. As expected, acromegaly was associated with a number of comorbidities (mainly hypertension and type II diabetes mellitus) and a high rate of patients’ hospitalization.

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Funding:

This research received the unconditional support of Pfizer srl.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Endocrinology, Department of Internal Medicine and Medical Specialties (DIMI), University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy

    Federico Gatto, Francesco Cocchiara, Claudia Campana, Carlotta Dell’Aquila, Marica Arvigo, Massimo Giusti & Diego Ferone

  2. Center of Excellence for Biomedical Research (CEBR), Policlinico San Martino, University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy

    Federico Gatto, Marica Arvigo & Diego Ferone

  3. Department of Biomedical and Dental Sciences and Morphofunctional Imaging, University of Messina, Messina, Italy

    Gianluca Trifirò

  4. Health Search, Italian College of General Practitioners and Primary Care, Florence, Italy

    Francesco Lapi

  5. Department of Experimental Medicine, Pharmacology Section, Campania Regional Centre of Pharmacovigilance and Pharmacoepidemiology, University of Campania, Naples, Italy

    Carmen Ferrajolo

  6. Italian College of General Practitioners and Primary Care, Florence, Italy

    Claudio Cricelli

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  1. Federico Gatto
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Correspondence to Federico Gatto.

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Conflict of interest

F.G. received fees for lectures and/or participation to advisory boards for Novartis, AMCo, and IONIS Pharmaceuticals. D.F. received grants and fees for lectures and participation to advisory boards for Novartis, Ipsen, and Pfizer. The remaining authors have declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Gatto, F., Trifirò, G., Lapi, F. et al. Epidemiology of acromegaly in Italy: analysis from a large longitudinal primary care database. Endocrine 61, 533–541 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12020-018-1630-4

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