Survival patterns for malignant mesothelioma: The seer experience

Abstract

Statistical analyses of 1,475 histologically confirmed cases of malignant mesothelioma ascertained through the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) Program of the National Cancer Institute for the years 1973-1984 showed age at diagnosis, sex, stage of disease, type of treatment, and geographic area of residence to be important predictors of patient survival, although type of treatment may be confounded with prognostic factors (patients selected for surgical treatment tended to have better performance status than other patients). Women below the age of 50 had an unusually long survival, even after adjustment for the effects of other variables in the model. A relatively large proportion of female cases had site of disease designated as peritoneum, but site was not a significant prognostic factor. These results suggest that age, gender and stage of disease should be carefully considered in designing and analyzing clinical trials for persons with mesothelioma. Survival was shorter in the 4 SEER registries which had shipbuilding as a major industry than in the others with less potential asbestos exposure, offering weak support for the hypothesis that asbestos-exposed cases of mesothelioma have worse survival experience than other cases.

Peritoneal Mesothelioma and Asbestos: Clarifying the Relationship by Epidemiology

“…"The presence of eight cases of peritoneal mesothelioma in the study population (SIR=25.04 (CI 10.78-49.33) confirmed the significantly elevated incidence of these cancers for both genders" [41]. The results agree with an American study [42,43] which compiled all cases peritoneal mesothelioma from 1973 to 1984 and in which the percentage of cases in women was higher than in men. This finding is contrary to other studies that claim a lesser causal relationship between asbestos exposure and peritoneal mesothelioma in women as compared to men [20].…”

“…There are multiple studies in which women were exposed to amphibole and/or chrysotile asbestos and developed peritoneal mesothelioma [41,43,[51][52][53]57,58,73,[79][80][81][82][83][84][85][86][87] There are additional studies of female peritoneal mesothelioma. Keal [88] reported eight female cases of peritoneal cancers on an examination of records from London hospital records and specimens (four of which were probably from the ovary and four from the peritoneum) who all had asbestosis.…”

Malignant mesothelioma with heterologous elements: clinicopathological correlation of 27 cases and literature review

“…National mesothelioma registries report exposure to asbestos in approximately 90% of male 34,35 and 70% of female patients. 36 Our data are …”

Predictions of mortality from pleural mesothelioma in Italy: A model based on asbestos consumption figures supports results from age‐period‐cohort models

“…1,2 The disease has a very poor prognosis and survival is generally shorter than 1 year. [3][4][5] Mesothelioma was not well captured in mortality statistics because of the absence of a specific code in the International Classification of Disease and Related Health Problems (ICD) revisions up to ICD-9. Mortality from primary pleural cancer was therefore often used as a proxy of PM incidence despite concerns about the accuracy of death certificates.…”