Abstract 5210: Incidence and mortality trends of prostate cancer in southern Thailand
Authors: Alvarez Christian , Virani Shama , Meza Rafael , Rozek Laura , Sriplung Hutcha , Mondul Alison M. 
Published: July 2016

Background: Prostate cancer is one of the most commonly diagnosed cancers in men worldwide. In Asia, the incidence of prostate cancer is expected to increase in the next decades as the population ages and as developing Asian countries undergo the epidemiologic transition. There is a scarcity of studies on the epidemiology of prostate cancer in Thailand. The characterization and projection of the burden of prostate cancer are important to design cost-effective strategies for the prevention and control of this disease. The purpose of this study is to examine incidence and mortality trends of prostate cancer in southern Thailand.

Methods: Incident prostate cancer cases from the Songkhla cancer registry were used to analyze incidence and mortality trends; complete data on incidence was available from 1990-2013 and data on mortality was available from 1990-2010. Characteristics of the cases on sociodemographic factors and tumor characteristics were collected, as was vital status. Joinpoint analysis was used to examine the incidence and mortality trends and calculate the annual percent change (APC). The number of joinpoints, slope of the trends, and their significance was determined by permutation tests. Incidence and mortality rates were standardized to the Segi's world standard population.

Results: Eight hundred fifty-five prostate cancer cases were diagnosed from 1990 to 2013. The median age at diagnosis was 74 and 89.6% of the diagnosed cases were Buddhist, with the remainder being Muslim. The majority (79.8%) of prostate cancers were unstaged. However, among those cases whose tumors were staged, the distribution was as follows: 3.5% stage I, 17.9% stage II, 2.9% stage III, 75.7% stage IV. The proportion of unstaged tumors decreased during the period 2005-2009 compared to earlier periods, and there was an increase in the proportion of stage II tumors for the same period. The overall prostate cancer incidence rates increased significantly at an APC of 5.1% (95%CI: 3.8, 6.4) from 1990 to 2013. Among Buddhist men, the APC was very similar to the overall incidence (APC: 5.2%, 95%CI: 4.0, 6.5), while we observed a very low incidence rate and no evidence of an increasing trend in Muslim men. As of 2010, 72.7% of the cases had died. Similar to incidence rates, prostate cancer mortality rates have significantly increased at and APC of 3.2% (95CI%: 1.7, 4.8) from 1990 to 2010.

Conclusion: This analysis showed that there has been a significant increase in prostate cancer incidence and mortality in Southern Thailand during the period 1990-2013. Next steps include assessing the effects of age, calendar year, and birth-cohort on the incidence and mortality of prostate cancer and projection of the incidence and mortality rates over the next fifteen years in order to fully characterize this cancer and help to design strategies to reduce the future burden of prostate cancer in Thailand.

Citation Format: Christian Alvarez, Shama Virani, Rafael Meza, Laura Rozek, Hutcha Sriplung, Alison M. Mondul. Incidence and mortality trends of prostate cancer in southern Thailand. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 107th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2016 Apr 16-20; New Orleans, LA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2016;76(14 Suppl):Abstract nr 5210.