Clinicopathological Findings of Retinoblastoma: A 10-Year Experience from a Tertiary Hospital in Kampala, Uganda

Background . Retinoblastoma (RB) is one of the most common cancers occurring in young children in sub-Saharan Africa. The incidence rate reported in the literature is 9,000 new cases per year, which corresponds to 1 in 15,000 births. This study aimed at analyzing the clinicopathological findings in children with RB in Uganda. Purpose . The purpose of this study was to describe and analyze the clinicopathological findings in the patients with RB. Design . This was a cross-sectional analytical study involving 234 eyeball surgical specimens from 214 patients with RB diagnosed between January 2006 and December 2015. Results . The mean age of the patients was 27.8 months (SD = 21.413, range: 1–132 months). More than half of the cases, 50.9%, presented with leucokoria. Invasion of choroid, sclera, anterior chamber, and optic nerve was found in 26.5% ( n  = 58), 51.2% ( n  = 88), 26.2% ( n  = 45), and 29.2% ( n  = 49), respectively. Twenty-six percent ( n  = 56) of the cases with intraocular tumour were at stage I and all patients with metastasis 4.7% ( n  = 11) had stage IV. The correlation between postlaminar optic nerve invasion and massive choroidal invasion was statistically significant ( P = 0.002 ). Also, there was a statistical significance difference between metastasis and postlaminar invasion ( P = 0.004 ). Conclusion . The majority of children with RB in Uganda present clinically with leucokoria, and their parents or guardians seek medical intervention at a later stage. Moreover, there was a noticeably significant lag period for the patients to begin treatment after the diagnosis was done.