Epidemiological Study of Lung Cancer in East Azerbaijan, Iran

Background: Lung cancer is the most common cause of cancer death worldwide with more than 1.3 million people dying of the disease annually. In Asia, the incidence and mortality rates of lung cancer are generally lower than those in western countries. We aimed to obtain cancer incidence data from the East Azerbaijan, Iran; to select the target populations for our future cancer field studies. Methods: Diagnosed primary lung cancer cases and pleura and trachea during five years (2002-2006) were collected from the hospital or private pathology laboratories in East Azerbaijan and analyzed using SPSS 13.0 after metastatic and same cases exclusion. Results: In this study 159314 pathology records were studied in hospitals and laboratories; 12083 of them were cancer cases. 9166 of them were primary cancer patients and Azerbaijan residents. A total of 469 new lung cancer cases (81% male, 19% female) were diagnosed during the years 2002–2006, the age-adjusted incidence rate (ASR) per 100,000 being 16.6 for males and 4.2 for females. Squamous cell carcinoma was the most common histological type (58.5%), the proportion of adenocarcinoma being 27.6%, small cell carcinoma 12.6% and large cell carcinoma 0.6%. ASR was calculated for cancer of pleura (0.4, 0.3) and for cancer of trachea (0.2, 0.1) per 100000 in male and female, respectively. Conclusion: This study is the first report of respiratory tract cancer incidence in East Azerbaijan. The results of the present study are statistic analysis of the cancer prevalence and incidence in Iran which mainly correspond with the international reports and is a scientific tool we want to offer to all those who work in the prevention, care and treatment of cancer in Iran.