A study has been released on the incidence of polycythemia vera in Taiwan for 2016-2017.
This report is of interest due to its large sample size of 2647 PV patients and because it covers a wide array of information, including treatments and mortality figures (although noting that interferon treatment was not readily available in Taiwan in 2016-2017).

In the Taiwanese study, PV incidence rates were estimated to be 2.41 and 2.65 cases per 100,000 people in 2016 and 2017, respectively.

In Australia, the reported incidence of PV from 2007 to 2016 was 1.4 cases per 100,000 people. This is based on Australian state cancer registry data, substantially lower than Taiwan and several other countries. It is suspected that in Australia, not all PV was being reported during that period. This is likely due to some inconsistent reporting practices in states and territories as well as bone marrow biopsies not always being undertaken. (A bone marrow biopsy diagnosis is automatically reported to cancer registries.)

Of further interest is that this Taiwanese study compares PV incidence and prevalence data from other countries. The rate of PV in the USA is much higher than in other countries.  This study will be useful for Australian researchers when comparable Australian data becomes available later in 2023.

The study concludes …..

‘This nationwide cross-sectional study provides a snapshot of the real-world clinical landscape of PV in Taiwan. This study reported a number of patient characteristics that were found to be different to the Caucasian populations reported in previous studies, which may provide some evidence that warrants further investigation into the genetics of PV among racial groups. This study also reported several similarities and differences of treatment patterns compared with other countries reported in previous literature.’

The full article is available at Real-world patient characteristics and treatment patterns of polycythemia vera in Taiwan between 2016 and 2017: a nationwide cross-sectional study