TONGUE CANCER RATES SKYROCKET AMONG YOUNG WHITE WOMEN
TONGUE CANCER RATES SKYROCKET AMONG YOUNG WHITE WOMEN Tongue cancer is appearing in increasing numbers among young people in the United States. Once largely the affliction of retirement age males who smoked and drank to excess, oral cancer incidences have
TONGUE CANCER RATES SKYROCKET AMONG YOUNG WHITE WOMEN
Tongue cancer is appearing in increasing numbers among young people in the United States. Once largely the affliction of retirement-age males who smoked and drank to excess, oral cancer incidences have crossed into the group of adults age 18 to age 44 at an escalating pace. More puzzling, perhaps, is that the group of young people in which incidences are increasing is, for the most part, composed of non-drinkers and non-smokers.
A study completed at the University of North Carolina (UNC) investigated what may be behind this trend, and offers a tip for how health care workers might respond.
The UNC team mapped data about oral squamous cell carcinoma of the tongue recorded between 1975 and 2007 by the National Cancer Institute. A steep increase in incidences of the disease during that period was noted. The study revealed incidences rose 28% among all individuals age 18 to age 44—and when the study was narrowed to only white people, the number of incidences in that age group jumped by 67%. The most jolting figure, however, appears among white females age 18 to age 44, where a 111% leap was recorded by the end of the study period.
Researchers say the profile of heavy tobacco and alcohol use does not seem to apply to the women studied by the UNC team.
“Our findings suggest that the epidemiology of this cancer in young, white females may be unique and that the causative factors may be things other than tobacco and alcohol abuse,” notes Bisham Chera, MD, the study’s lead author and an assistant professor in the UNC Department of Radiation Oncology. Complete results of the study appear in the April 10, 2011 Journal of Clinical Oncology.
Though tongue cancer is still relatively rare compared to cancers found in the breast, lung or prostate, the rising occurrences of the disease merits attention, Chera says. “Primary care physicians and dentists should be aware of this increasing incidence and screen patients appropriately,” he cautions.
Source: University of North Carolina School of Medicine
