Cancer Mortality, State Mean Elevations, and other Selected Predictors

Abstract

ᮀ This ecological inquiry compares cancer mortality rates in the U.S. to the predictor of natural background radiation (via land elevation means) along with eight other predictors thought to be associated with cancer mortality. Age-adjusted cancer mortality in 2006 was compared to the predictors of mean land elevation, percent of smokers, educational attainment, percent of population without health insurance, income, obesity, health perception, physical activity, and diet. Among the six predictors considered appropriate for multiple linear regression, three were found to be statistically significant; from strongest to weakest, these three were: smoking, land elevation, and educational attainment. The predictors of smoking and educational attainment have long been considered associated with cancer mortality. The finding that the predictor of land elevation / natural background radiation is inversely related to cancer mortality is another piece of evidence supporting the theory of radiation hormesis. In this study, land elevation / natural background radiation ranked second in predictive strength regarding cancer mortality, behind smoking and ahead of educational attainment. Since this is an ecological inquiry, no causal inferences can be made.

Land Elevation and Cancer Mortality in U.S. Cities and Counties using Median Elevations Derived from Geographic Information Systems

“…In a previous similar study, where mean elevations for entire state (for 50 states and District of Columbia), a stronger correlation was found (-0.656;Hart and Hyun, 2010) for NBR compared to what was found in the present study for both cities and counties (~ -0.460). Assuming city and county findings are more accurate than state, the previous study may have slightly over-estimated the inverse association that appears to exist between NBR and cancer mortality rates.…”

“…Some of the studies on land elevation (e.g., Hart and Hyun; used archived data for the land elevation variable and in one of these (Hart and Hyun) the average land elevation for the entire state was used. The present ecological study utilizes an author (Hart)-generated method of obtaining land elevation values using geographic information systems (GIS).…”

Hardcore Smoking in Three South-East Asian Countries: Results from the Global Adult Tobacco Survey

“…Smoking attributable diseases including cancers are dose dependent like amount smoked, age of starting to smoke, duration of smoking, duration of quitting, etc (Hart et al, 2012;Peter et al, 2012). The dose dependent nature of different component constructs of hardcore smoking suggests that, they represent high risk groups for tobacco induced diseases.…”

Association between air temperature and deaths due to cancer and heart disease in Alabama

“…As was used in the Florida study [4] and by others looking at health effects of temperature [5] an ecological design is used in the present study. Since land elevation has been shown to be related to death rates [6][7][8], it was also included in the Florida and present study as a second "dose" (predictor) variable.…”