FREE NEJM E-TOC    HOME   |   SUBSCRIBE   |   CURRENT ISSUE   |   PAST ISSUES   |   COLLECTIONS   |   Search Term  Advanced Search

Sign in | Get NEJM's E-Mail Table of Contents — Free | Subscribe

Previous Volume 333:1594-1599 December 14, 1995 Number 24 Next

	Full Text PDF Add to Personal Archive Add to Citation Manager Notify a Friend E-mail When Cited PubMed Citation

ABSTRACT

Background Certain types of cancer in children and young adults have been linked with an increased risk of cancer in close relatives. However, the relation between childhood cancer and familial risk remains to be fully assessed in population-based studies.

Methods We conducted a nationwide study in Denmark of 11,380 parents of children with cancer. The children were identified from records in the Danish Cancer Registry; their parents were identified from population registers. The occurrence and rate of cancer in the parents were determined with use of the Cancer Registry's files and compared with national incidence rates for various categories of tumor.

Results Overall, 1445 cancers were diagnosed in the parents, as compared with 1496 expected from national incidence rates, to yield standardized incidence ratios of 1.0 (95 percent confidence interval, 0.9 to 1.0) for all parents, 1.0 for mothers, and 0.9 for fathers. The lower rate of cancer among fathers reflected their lower standardized incidence ratio for lung cancer (0.8; 95 percent confidence interval, 0.6 to 0.9), as calculated from 114 observations.

Conclusions Genetic determinants are important in several types of childhood cancer, but the genetic susceptibility to tumors does not generally extend to the parents of children with cancer, nor do the patterns of incidence point to the influence of shared environmental factors. Thus, cancer in children should not be viewed as a general marker for an increased risk of cancer in the patients' parents.

Source Information

From the Division for Cancer Epidemiology, Danish Cancer Society, Copenhagen, Denmark (J.H.O., N.S., A.B.); and the Epidemiology and Biostatistics Program, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Md. (J.D.B., J.F.F.).

Address reprint requests to Dr. Olsen at the Danish Cancer Society, Division for Cancer Epidemiology, Strandboulevarden 49, DK-2100 Copenhagen, Denmark.

Full Text of this Article

This article has been cited by other articles:

• Olsen, J. H., Moller, T., Anderson, H., Langmark, F., Sankila, R., Tryggvadottir, L., Winther, J. F., Rechnitzer, C., Jonmundsson, G., Christensen, J., Garwicz, S. (2009). Lifelong Cancer Incidence in 47 697 Patients Treated for Childhood Cancer in the Nordic Countries. JNCI J Natl Cancer Inst 101: 806-813 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Yip, B. H, Pawitan, Y., Czene, K. (2006). Parental age and risk of childhood cancers: a population-based cohort study from Sweden. Int J Epidemiol 35: 1495-1503 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Chuang, E. Y., Chen, X., Tsai, M.-H., Yan, H., Li, C.-Y., Mitchell, J. B., Nagasawa, H., Wilson, P. F., Peng, Y., Fitzek, M. M., Bedford, J. S., Little, J. B. (2006). Abnormal gene expression profiles in unaffected parents of patients with hereditary-type retinoblastoma.. Cancer Res. 66: 3428-3433 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• LICHTERMANN, D. (2005). Cancer Risk in Parents of Patients With Schizophrenia. Am. J. Psychiatry 162: 1024-1024 [Full Text]  
• Raaschou-Nielsen, O., Obel, J., Dalton, S., Tjonneland, A., Hansen, J. (2004). Socioeconomic status and risk of childhood leukaemia in Denmark. Scand J Public Health 32: 279-286 [Abstract]  
• Dalton, S. O., Laursen, T. M., Mellemkjaer, L., Johansen, C., Mortensen, P. B. (2004). Risk for Cancer in Parents of Patients With Schizophrenia. Am. J. Psychiatry 161: 903-908 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Verkooijen, H. M., Fioretta, G., Chappuis, P. O., Vlastos, G., Sappino, A. P., Benhamou, S., Bouchardy, C. (2004). Set-up of a population-based familial breast cancer registry in Geneva, Switzerland: validation of first results. Ann Oncol 15: 350-353 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Hemminki, K., Li, X. (2003). Familial Risks in Nervous System Tumors. Cancer Epidemiol. Biomarkers Prev. 12: 1137-1142 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Pang, D., McNally, R., Kelsey, A., Birch, J. M. (2003). Cancer Incidence and Mortality among the Parents of a Population-based Series of 2604 Children with Cancer. Cancer Epidemiol. Biomarkers Prev. 12: 538-544 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Olsen, J. H., Sorensen, H. T., Friis, S., McLaughlin, J. K., Steffensen, F. H., Nielsen, G. L., Andersen, M., Fraumeni, J. F. Jr, Olsen, J. (1997). Cancer Risk in Users of Calcium Channel Blockers. Hypertension 29: 1091-1094 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Sorensen, T. I.A. (1995). Is There an Inherited General Susceptibility to Cancer?. NEJM 333: 1633-1635 [Full Text]