In a study reported in JAMA Network Open, Zhu et al found that cancer-specific mortality rates have decreased overall among U.S. Asian and Pacific Islander populations during recent years, although increases in cancer-specific mortality have been reported for some cancers.
Study Details
The cross-sectional study used data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Wide-Ranging Online Data for Epidemiologic Research database to obtain age-adjusted cancer death rates among Asian American and Pacific Islander individuals of all ages between January 1999 and December 2020.
Key Findings
Between 1999 and 2020, 305,386 Asian American and Pacific Islander individuals (median age = 69.5 years) died of cancer in the United States. Among all individuals, the cancer-specific mortality rate decreased by 1.5% annually. The cancer-specific mortality rate decrease among men (average annual percent change [AAPC] = −1.8%, 95% confidence interval [CI] = −2.2% to −1.3%) was greater than that among women (AAPC = −1.1%, 95% CI = −1.2% to −1.0%).
Among women, cancer-specific mortality rates decreased for most cancer types but increased for uterine cancer (AAPC = 2.5%, 95% CI = 2.0%–3.0%) and brain and central nervous system cancers (AAPC = 1.4%, 95% CI = 0.7%–2.1%). Colorectal cancer–specific mortality rates increased among men aged 45 to 54 years (AAPC = 1.3%, 95% CI = 0.5%–2.1%).
Liver and intrahepatic bile duct cancer mortality increased for both men (AAPCs = 1.3%–2.1%) and women (AAPCs = 1.5%–2.1%) in all U.S. census regions. Uterine cancer mortality increased in all regions for women (AAPCs = 1.0%–1.3%), and pancreatic cancer mortality increased in the Midwest for both men (AAPC = 0.6%) and women (AAPC = 0.4%).
The investigators concluded: “Although these findings show an overall decrease in [cancer-specific mortality] among Asian American and Pacific Islander populations, specific cancer types exhibited increased mortality rates, with further disparities by sex and age. Targeted, culturally adapted clinical and public health interventions are needed to narrow disparities in cancer mortality.”
Sophia C. Kamran, MD, of the Department of Radiation Oncology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, is the corresponding author of the JAMA Network Open article.
Disclosure: For full disclosures of the study authors, visit jamanetwork.com.
