Life time risk for development of ten major cancers in India and its trends over the years 1982 to 2000

Background : Understanding cancer magnitude, risk and trends will be of help in cancer control programs.
Aim : To study trends in cumulative risk up to 64 years of age as lifetime risk of developing major cancers in India during the years 1982 to 2000.
Design : Retrospective.
Setting : Secondary sources of cancer-registration data.
Materials and Methods : Data on age-specific cancer-incidence rates were collected for patients 0-64 years of age of either sex for 10 major cancer sites from the National Cancer Registry Program (NCRP) reports of India from Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Bhopal and Delhi; and Barshi registries for the years 1982 or 1988 to 2000.
Statistical Analysis : Cumulative risks computed for lifetime development of cancer. Linear trends were studied using simple linear regressions.
Results : The lifetime risk among females for the10 cancer sites ranged from 0.02 to 3.3% and from 0.04 to 2.4% for the years 1982 and 2000 respectively; whereas among males, it ranged from 0.04 to 0.89% and from 0.05 to 0.95% respectively. Significant (P < 0.05) increasing trends were observed for breast, non-Hodgkin′s lymphoma (NHL), gallbladder, thyroid and ovary cancers among females; while declining trends were observed for cervix, mouth, stomach, esophagus and tongue cancers. Among males, significant (P < 0.05) increasing trends were observed for NHL and prostate cancer; whereas declining trends were observed for stomach, liver, hypopharynx and tongue cancers. Cancers of mouth and esophagus showed increasing trends (P < 0.05) in some regions and declining trends (P < 0.05) in some other.
Conclusion : Significant and higher rates of positive trends in lifetime cancer risks for breast cancer among females and for NHL among both sexes were observed.