Skin cancer facts

Source: Skincancer.org

Skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in the United States. More than 3.5 million skin cancers in over two million people are diagnosed annually.

Each year there are more new cases of skin cancer than the combined incidence of cancers of the breast, prostate, lung and colon.

Treatment of nonmelanoma skin cancers increased by nearly 77 percent between 1992 and 2006.

Over the past three decades, more people have had skin cancer than all other cancers combined.

One in five Americans will develop skin cancer in the course of a lifetime.

13 million white non-Hispanics living in the US at the beginning of 2007 had at least one nonmelanoma skin cancer, typically diagnosed as basal cell carcinoma (BCC) or squamous cell carcinoma (SCC).

Basal cell carcinoma is the most common form of skin cancer; an estimated 2.8 million are diagnosed annually in the US. BCCs are rarely fatal, but can be highly disfiguring if allowed to grow.

Squamous cell carcinoma is the second most common form of skin cancer. An estimated 700,000 cases of SCC are diagnosed each year in the US.

The incidence of squamous cell carcinoma has been rising, with increases up to 200 percent over the past three decades in the US.

About two percent of squamous cell carcinoma patients – between 3,900 and 8,800 people – died from the disease in the US in 2012.

Between 40 and 50 percent of Americans who live to age 65 will have either BCC or SCC at least once.

Actinic keratosis is the most common precancer; it affects more than 58 million Americans.

Approximately 65 percent of all squamous cell carcinomas and 36 percent of all basal cell carcinomas arise in lesions that previously were diagnosed as actinic keratoses.

About 90 percent of nonmelanoma skin cancers are associated with exposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation from the sun.

Half of all adults report at least one sunburn in the past 12 months.

MELANOMA

One person dies of melanoma every hour (every 57 minutes).

An estimated 76,100 new cases of invasive melanoma will be diagnosed in the US in 2014.

An estimated 9,710 people will die of melanoma in 2014.

Melanoma accounts for less than two percent of skin cancer cases, but the vast majority of skin cancer deaths.

Of the seven most common cancers in the US, melanoma is the only one whose incidence is increasing. Between 2000 and 2009, incidence climbed 1.9 percent annually.

One in 50 men and women will be diagnosed with melanoma of the skin during their lifetime.

In 2009, there were approximately 876,344 men and women alive in the U.S. with a history of melanoma.

Survival with melanoma increased from 49 percent (1950 – 1954) to 92 percent (1996 – 2003).

About 86 percent of melanomas can be attributed to exposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation from the sun.

Melanoma is one of only three cancers with an increasing mortality rate for men, along with liver cancer and esophageal cancer.

Survivors of melanoma are about nine times as likely as the general population to develop a new melanoma.

The vast majority of mutations found in melanoma are caused by ultraviolet radiation.

Melanoma is the most common form of cancer for young adults 25-29 years old and the second most common form of cancer for young people 15-29 years old.

The overall five-year survival rate for patients whose melanoma is detected early, before the tumor has spread to regional lymph nodes or other organs, is about 98 percent in the US.

The survival rate falls to 62 percent when the disease reaches the lymph nodes, and 16 percent when the disease metastasizes to distant organs.

A person’s risk for melanoma doubles if he or she has had more than five sunburns.

One or more blistering sunburns in childhood or adolescence more than double a person’s chances of developing melanoma later in life.

Regular daily use of an SPF 15 or higher sunscreen reduces the risk of developing squamous cell carcinoma by 40 percent and the risk of developing melanoma by 50 percent.

Up to 40 percent of annual deaths from each of five leading US causes are preventable

Source CDC

Each year, nearly 900,000 Americans die prematurely from the five leading causes of death – yet 20 percent to 40 percent of the deaths from each cause could be prevented, according to a study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The five leading causes of death in the United States are heart disease, cancer, chronic lower respiratory diseases, stroke, and unintentional injuries. Together they accounted for 63 percent of all U.S. deaths in 2010, with rates for each cause varying greatly from state to state.

The study suggests that, if all states had the lowest death rate observed for each cause, it would be possible to prevent:

• 34 percent of premature deaths from heart diseases, prolonging about 92,000 lives

• 21 percent of premature cancer deaths, prolonging about 84,500 lives

• 39 percent of premature deaths from chronic lower respiratory diseases, prolonging about 29,000 lives

• 33 percent of premature stroke deaths, prolonging about 17,000 lives

• 39 percent of premature deaths from unintentional injuries, prolonging about 37,000 lives

Modifiable risk factors are largely responsible for each of the leading causes of death:

• Heart disease risks include tobacco use, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, type 2 diabetes, poor diet, overweight, and lack of physical activity.

• Cancer risks include tobacco use, poor diet, lack of physical activity, overweight, sun exposure, certain hormones, alcohol, some viruses and bacteria, ionizing radiation, and certain chemicals and other substances.

• Chronic respiratory disease risks include tobacco smoke, second-hand smoke exposure, other indoor air pollutants, outdoor air pollutants, allergens, and exposure to occupational agents.

• Stroke risks include high blood pressure, high cholesterol, heart disease, diabetes, overweight, previous stroke, tobacco use, alcohol use, and lack of physical activity.

• Unintentional injury risks include lack of seatbelt use, lack of motorcycle helmet use, unsafe consumer products, drug and alcohol use (including prescription drug misuse), exposure to occupational hazards, and unsafe home and community environments.

Healthy Hometown is working toward a “healthy” Clinton County.