Posted by Todd (65.187.231.105) on December 19, 2001 at 10:47:33:
In Reply to: Who's making these estimates? posted by Victor on December 19, 2001 at 10:25:16:
amongst the medical community, in part due to the publication over the years of studies which used very questionable methodologies.
There are 3 studies I am aware of that used methodologies that are considered by most to be acceptable:
Ekbom, et al sampled 9803 18 year old Swedish army recruits and found a prevalence of 92 per 100,000. D'Alessandro, et al surveyed the 21,792 inhabitants of the Republic of San Marino and found a prevelence of 69/100,000. Monteiro, et al conducted a survey of 2008 people in Porto, Italy and found 2 cases of CH, but only one fit the IHS criteria. The second is considered either: atypical CH or cluster-like. This yields a prevelence of either 1/2,000 or 1/1,000 depending on whether you include the second case or not. Accepting all this data results in an incidence of between .5/1000 and 1/1000.
Interestingly, the Swedish study shows .9/1000 - very close to the high end of prevelence, despite the fact that the study group consisted exclusively of 18 year olds. This would tend to contradict the long-held belief that onset typically occurs in the late 20's or 30's.
On the other hand, 100% of the residents of my house have CH. Go figure.
KTSSU,
T