Oral and oropharyngeal cancer in The Netherlands between 1989 and 2006: Increasing incidence, but not in young adults

To determine incidence trends of head and neck squamous cell carcinomas (HNSCC), we analyzed site-specific data collected by The Netherlands Cancer Registry by 15 years-of-age categories from 1989 2006. The age-standardized annual incidence trends of all sites taken together showed a significant decrease of 0.6% for males and a significant increase of 1.8% for females. The trend for oropharyngeal carcinoma was most remarkable, with a significant increase of 2.5% and 3.0% per year for males and females, respectively. The incidence of oral carcinoma also significantly increased with a more pronounced effect for females than for males (2.0% vs. 0.5% per year). As for hypopharyngeal cancer, a significant annual increase for females (2.5%) and a stable situation for males was observed. Cancer of the larynx was the only site that showed a significant decline for males (2.4% per year), whereas it remained stable for females. In young (<45 years) adults incidences decreased for all sites with 0.1-4.7%. In conclusion, recent incidence trends of HNSCC in The Netherlands vary between sites with a considerable increase of oropharyngeal cancer as the most remarkable finding. The reason for the decreasing annual incidence rate at all sites observed for Dutch young adults remains to be explained. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.