Photo by Rhoda Baer
Cancer patient receiving chemotherapy
A report on cancer in the US suggests the incidence of leukemia and myeloma has been on the rise in recent years, but the incidence of non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) has been on the decline.
Meanwhile, annual death rates for leukemia and NHL have decreased, and annual death rates for myeloma have decreased in men but not in women.
Furthermore, patients with leukemia, NHL, and myeloma have seen a substantial improvement in 5-year survival rates in recent years relative to patients in the late 1970s.
These findings are part of the Annual Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer, 1975-2014, which has been published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.
This report is released each year, but the current edition includes a special section focused on survival.
“While trends in death rates are the most commonly used measure to assess progress against cancer, survival trends are also an important measure to evaluate progress in improvement of cancer outcomes,” said Ahmedin Jemal, DVM, PhD, of the American Cancer Society.
“We last included a special section on cancer survival in 2004, and, as we found then, survival improved over time for almost all cancers at every stage of diagnosis.”
For the current report, researchers calculated the 5-year average annual percent changes (AAPCs) for 2009 to 2013 for cancer incidence and for 2010 to 2014 for cancer mortality.
Cancer incidence (2009-2013)
In women, the AAPC increased 1.5% for leukemia (P<0.05), decreased 0.5% for NHL (P<0.05), and increased 2.2% for myeloma (P<0.05).
In men, the AAPC increased 1.7% for leukemia (P<0.05), decreased 0.2% for NHL, and increased 2.8% for myeloma (P<0.05).
Cancer mortality (2010-2014)
In women, the AAPC decreased 1.2% for leukemia (P<0.05), decreased 2.2% for NHL (P<0.05), and increased 0.5% for myeloma.
In men, the AAPC decreased 1.0% for leukemia (P<0.05), decreased 2.0% for NHL (P<0.05), and decreased 0.9% for myeloma (P<0.05).
5-year survival
The researchers compared 5-year relative survival for cancers diagnosed from 1975 to 1977 and those diagnosed from 2006 to 2012.
The absolute percentage change over time (for both sexes combined) was 26.1% for NHL, 25.7% for myeloma, and 28.5% for leukemia.
Five-year survival for patients diagnosed in 1975-1977 was 46.5% for NHL, 24.6% for myeloma, and 34.2% for leukemia.
Five-year survival for patients diagnosed in 2006-2012 was 72.6% for NHL, 50.2% for myeloma, and 62.7% for leukemia.
