767 cases were malignant of digestive organs, followed by malignant of respiratory organs. Similar pattern recorded by Tung’s research where the figure for the former and the latter were 36.8% and 11.9% respectively. Fukhrul’s study also recorded the same results. Cancer of digestive and respiratory organs were leading sites in the cancer pattern of many nations. Health professionals, policy-makers and researchers need to make decisions and identify priorities for action in these kinds of cancer.
Our study found that cancer of liver and lung were more frequent in males. A similar result was presented in the statistics of WHO 2018 in Vietnam, where cancer figures in males were 15.4% (liver) and 14.4% (lung). Vietnam has been a highly endemic country of hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections and these chronic liver diseases may be a contributing factor for causation of liver cancer. A study in central Vietnam showed that approximately 90.0% of patients with HCC had evidence of HBV, and one-seventh of them were related to HCV. In our study, lung cancer was the second leading site among both males and females, which is similar to the study conducted in America. This could be attributable to the higher prevalence of smoking among Vietnamese as well as this country compared to other nations.
The most common cancer in females was breast cancer. This finding was similar to figures in the study of Basav. Cervical cancer was the common cancer in women in the previous studies. But since the 2000s, breast cancer has always taken the first position in patterns cancer. This showed the effectiveness of screening program for early detection of cervical cancer as well as the HPV vaccination. In our study, for females the third leading cancer site was thyroid. It was similar to the result in Ty’s study.
It can be seen from our study that the middle aged group was at the highest risk of developing cancers. Malignant of male genital organs made up the highest percentage in advanced age groups whereas malignant of breast recorded the highest proportion in the younger one. Our study also showed that: In the age groups under 50 years, the number of female cases was higher than male ones. It is essential to setting priorities for cancer screening measures at the appropriate age.
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