Epidemiological Profile of Cancer and Investigation of Some Risk Factors in Morocco

Abstract

Aims: Cancer is a major burden of disease worldwide. Each year, tens of millions of people are diagnosed with cancer around the world, and more than half of the patients eventually die from it. The present work aims to bring out the epidemiological profile of cancer and to find out the association that would exist between the gender of patients, the tumor localization and the vital prognosis. Methodology: The present work consists in a retrospective study carried out in an oncology centre in Rabat, considered to be representative of the private sector in the northern region of Morocco, and based on a sample of 1756 cases of cancer treated during the period January 2005-December 2006. Results: Among the 1756 studied cases, 58% are females and 42% are males. The mean age of patients is 53±15 years old. The repartition of patients according to the localization shows that breast cancer is the most frequent with 24% of cases, followed by cervix cancer with 11% and lung cancer with 8%. The study shows that the higher number of deaths occurred in lung cancer patients with 21% of all deaths in our sample. Nevertheless, the highest lethality is observed for the liver cancer with 37.5%. The results also show that males display a significantly higher risk for bladder, lung and stomach cancers, whereas females have significantly higher risk for thyroid, skin and gall bladder cancers. The calculation of death risk by localization shows that liver and lung cancers present the worst vital prognosis. Finally, we demonstrated that the survival length after beginning of treatment depends on cancer localization. Conclusion: More efforts should be made by health authorities in Morocco to fight against cancer in especially those with bad vital prognosis.