07 Jul The Gender and Geography Statistics of Melanoma in Canada
Last week, we posted a broad overview of the past ten years in melanoma statistics, drawn from the Canadian Cancer Society’s documents Canadian Cancer Statistics 2014, Special Topic
07 Jul The Gender and Geography Statistics of Melanoma in Canada
Last week, we posted a broad overview of the past ten years in melanoma statistics, drawn from the Canadian Cancer Society’s documents Canadian Cancer Statistics 2014, Special Topic: Skin Cancers and 2015, Special Topic: Predictions of the Future Burden of Cancer in Canada. This week, we’re going to focus on more geographically specific statistics; what is the melanoma landscape in your province like?
If you read last week’s post, you’ll know that in Canada, males are generally more likely to be diagnosed with melanoma than females. Over the past 25 years, the age standardized incidence rate (ASIR) of melanoma in Canadian males increased on average 2% yearly, while the ASIR of females increased but 1.5%; however, this percentage has jumped to 2.5% over the past eight years for females, likely due to the advent of tanning salons (2014 79). Between 1993 and 2009, men have seen a lifetime risk increase of 0.8%, while the lifetime risk increase rose 0.7% for women (79). Mortality statistics indicate that the melanoma death rates among Canadian males and females are consistent with diagnosis rates; the age standardized mortality rates (ASMR) have risen 1.2% yearly for males, 0.4% for females.
The higher melanoma incidence rates among men are also generally consistent from province to province, with the exception of Saskatchewan, in which the ASIR in 2010 saw 9.5 melanoma cases in every 100,000 males and 11.3 in every 100,000 females (2014 93, “Table 7.1”).
(2014 93, “Table 7.1 Annual Percent Change in Age-Standardized Incidence Rates (ASIR) for Melanoma of the Skin by Province and Sex, 1986-2010”)
The comparative incidence rate of melanoma in men is consistently higher in every province (except Saskatchewan), though, as indicated by the annual percent change being greater for Canadian females by 0.6% overall, melanoma rates among women are catching up. The greatest discrepancy between males and females is on Prince Edward Island, which has the highest provincial rate of melanoma in Canada for males (93, “Table 7.1”). The demographic with the lowest melanoma rate in Canada, as of 2010, was women in Newfoundland and Labrador (93, “Table 7.1”).
(2014 93, “Table 7.2 Annual Percent Change in Age-Standardized Mortality Rates (ASMR) for Melanoma of the Skin by Province and Sex, 1986-2009”)
Thankfully, the age-standardized mortality rates (ASMR) for Canadians are conside