Years of Life Lost due to Breast Cancer Mortality in Central Province of Iran

Introduction : Number of deaths is not suitable to prioritize programs for resource allocation purposes because it may not show the importance of prevention or early diagnosis of certain diseases at younger ages because of the influence of common causes in the elderly. Breast cancer is the first leading cause of female cancer deaths . We aimed to determine the 7 years Years of Life Lost ( YLL ) due to breast cancer in Yazd province. Method: Data obtained from death registration system (2004-2010) were used to calculate the YLL , based on each individual’s age at death, and the standardized expected YLL method was used ( discount rate of 0.03, the age weight of 0.04, and correction factor of 0.165). All data were analysed in Epi6 and Excel 2007. Result: 237 Breast Cancer deaths ( 237 female ) were registered . breast cancer accounted for 6.16 % of all cancer deaths (7th cause) and it was first cause of cancer death in yazdian women with 13.9%.Premature Breast cancer deaths have caused 3413 YLL for female & 55 YLL for males.Females loose on average more life years to cancer than men (14.7 vs 11 years).Breast cancer deaths (with 8.5% total YLL due to cancer death) were 5th cause of Years of Life Lost in both sexes . Conclusion: The use of YLLs is a better index for measure of premature mortality for ranking of diseases than do death counts and will help to evaluate and develope, better public health interventions.