Lung Cancer and associated Risk Factors in The West Bank

Since no previous studies were carried out on large scale regarding lung cancer status and associated risk factors in Palestine, the current study aimed at evaluating the status of the disease and the possibly associated risk factors among the Palestinian inhabitance of the West Bank area. This was achieved through reviewing and analyzing the available patient's files form the period 1997-2000. Files for previous years were excluded due to several problems associated with the used filing systems prior the transfer of authority to the Palestinians. A total of 286 files were reviewed and the collected data was then analyzed using SPSS. The over all prevalence rate of lung cancer in the West Bank area excluding Jerusalem was 18/100,000. The highest rates were found in the districts of Jenin (24.4) and Tulakrem (22.9). This low prevalence, compared to the internationally reported, is due to multi factorial reasons among which is under-registration, details are shown in text. The most prevalent histological type in the study population was adenocarcenoma and was represented by 31.5% squamous cell carcinoma was the second common histological type (24.8%). Highest prevalent areas were found in Jenin and Tulkarem, where charcoal production in the former and industrial fumes in the later are significant, also farming is prodominant in both areas. In conclusion, we believe that there is an urgent need to have better national method for cancer registration as well as an urgent need to evaluate risk factors associated with the observed increased incidence of lung cancer in the districts of Tulkarem and Jenin.