Abstract
Analysis of trends in mortality from respiratory cancer among women shows that, contrary to previous interpretation, there is no suggestion of any increase over time which might be due to recent increases in exposures to carcinogens. Although there are upward trends in the number of deaths, the crude death rate, and the age standardised rate, these are shown to be related to the aging of earlier cohorts of women who have experienced high mortality rates. More recent cohorts, born since the middle 1920s, show a decline. A simple technique to identify trends in different cohorts is described, and it is shown to be linked to the age-period-cohort modelling approach to investigating time trends. Dangers inherent in ignoring either period or cohort effects when describing one of these factors are discussed.
Full text
PDF
Selected References
These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.
- Beral V. Cancer of the cervix: a sexually transmitted infection? Lancet. 1974 May 25;1(7865):1037–1040. doi: 10.1016/s0140-6736(74)90432-2. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Epstein S. S., Swartz J. B. Fallacies of lifestyle cancer theories. Nature. 1981 Jan 15;289(5794):127–130. doi: 10.1038/289127a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Osmond C., Gardner M. J., Acheson E. D. Analysis of trends in cancer mortality in England and Wales during 1951-80 separating changes associated with period of birth and period of death. Br Med J (Clin Res Ed) 1982 Apr 3;284(6321):1005–1008. doi: 10.1136/bmj.284.6321.1005. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Osmond C., Gardner M. J. Age, period and cohort models applied to cancer mortality rates. Stat Med. 1982 Jul-Sep;1(3):245–259. doi: 10.1002/sim.4780010306. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Wald N., Doll R., Copeland G. Trends in tar, nicotine, and carbon monoxide yields of UK cigarettes manufactured since 1934. Br Med J (Clin Res Ed) 1981 Mar 7;282(6266):763–765. doi: 10.1136/bmj.282.6266.763. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]