• Janez Jazbec, Ljupco Todorovski, and Berta Jereb.
• Division of oncology and hematology, Department of Pediatrics, Medical Center, Vrazov trg 1, Ljubljana, Slovenia. janez.jazbec@mf.uni-lj.si
• Bmc Cancer. 2007 Feb 2; 7: 27.

BackgroundReports on childhood cancer survivors estimated cumulative probability of developing secondary neoplasms vary from 3.3% to 25% at 25 years from diagnosis, and the risk of developing another cancer to several times greater than in the general population.MethodsIn our retrospective study, we have used the classification tree multivariate method on a group of 849 first cancer survivors, to identify childhood cancer patients with the greatest risk for development of secondary neoplasms.ResultsIn observed group of patients, 34 develop secondary neoplasm after treatment of primary cancer. Analysis of parameters present at the treatment of first cancer, exposed two groups of patients at the special risk for secondary neoplasm. First are female patients treated for Hodgkin's disease at the age between 10 and 15 years, whose treatment included radiotherapy. Second group at special risk were male patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia who were treated at the age between 4.6 and 6.6 years of age.ConclusionThe risk groups identified in our study are similar to the results of studies that used more conventional approaches. Usefulness of our approach in study of occurrence of second neoplasms should be confirmed in larger sample study, but user friendly presentation of results makes it attractive for further studies.

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