title: Colorectal cancer in Egyptian patients under 40 years of age.
abstract: Although colorectal cancer is not a common cancer in Egypt, the age distribution of the disease shows that a high proportion occurs in children and adults under 40 years of age. We reviewed the records of 1,608 colorectal cancer patients treated in 4 cancer hospitals in Egypt during a period of 3 to 10 years. The hospitals in which about 85% of all colorectal cancer cases in Egypt were seen included Egypt's 2 major cancer centers, The National Cancer Institute (NCI) in Cairo and Tanta Cancer Center (TCC) in the mid-Nile Delta region, and 2 major university hospitals, Assiut University in South Egypt and Ain Shams University in Cairo. Our review showed that patients younger than 40 years represented 35.6% of all patients in the 4 cancer hospitals, and that these rates were similar among the hospitals and for the years reviewed. The male-to-female ratio increased from 1.0 to 1.7 for the age groups ranging from 0-9 and 30-39 years, and increased from 1.0 to 1.5 for the age groups ranging from 40-49 to over 60 years. More than half of all the patients had rectal tumors, and about 90% of the cancers were adenocarcinomas; 30.6% of patients younger than 40 years, compared with 13.8% of older patients, had mucin-producing tumors. This study confirmed the occurrence of a high colorectal cancer rate in young Egyptians, and it opens the door to future epidemiologic studies to identify causes and risk factors of this disease pattern in Egypt.
authors.affiliation: Department of Community Medicine, Menofeia Faculty of Medicine, Egypt.
authors.forename: A S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Soliman
authors.forename: M L
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Bondy
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Levin
authors.forename: M R
authors.initials: MR
authors.lastname: Hamza
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Ismail
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ismail
authors.forename: H M
authors.initials: HM
authors.lastname: Hammam
authors.forename: O H
authors.initials: OH
authors.lastname: el-Hattab
authors.forename: S M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Kamal
authors.forename: A G
authors.initials: AG
authors.lastname: Soliman
authors.forename: L A
authors.initials: LA
authors.lastname: Dorgham
authors.forename: R S
authors.initials: RS
authors.lastname: McPherson
authors.forename: R P
authors.initials: RP
authors.lastname: Beasley
mesh_terms: D000230:Adenocarcinoma / Q000453:epidemiology; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D015179:Colorectal Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology*; D004534:Egypt / Q000453:epidemiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged