Analysis of quarterly occurrence of selected types of congenital malformations in the Czech Republic in 1994-2008
Abstract
Paper presents an analysis of quarterly occurrence of selected types of congenital malformations in the Czech Republic in 1994-2008. For this purpose, mean incidences (per 10 000 live births) of 11 selected types of congenital malformations from partial periods 1974-1989 and 1990-2003 were calculated and compared to the incidences in each quarter from the period under the study 1994-2008.
Observed/expected rates for each type of malformation and each particular quarter were determined. During quarterly surveillance of malformation incidences, no changes supporting an important increase of a teratogenic potential in the Czech Republic were revealed.
On the other hand, isolated periodical changes of incidences and some random clusters were found. However, neither of these changes pointed towards an important increase of a teratogenic potential in a long-term scale