Report: Larynx cancer rate highest in Central, Eastern

By GATONYE GATHURA

NAIROBI, KENYA: Central and Eastern provinces have the highest rates of cancer of the voice box caused by too much smoking and alcohol use, according to a new study.

Researchers from the Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) and the University of Nairobi studied patients attending the referral hospital with cancer of the voice box and found Central to be responsible for almost half of all the cases in the country.

“The highland areas of Central had the highest rate of the disease at 46 per cent followed by Eastern at 16 per cent,” noted the researchers in a paper published on Tuesday in the International Journal of Otolaryngology.

Otolaryngology is the study of ear, nose, and throat conditions commonly called ENT.

The lowlands of Rift Valley, Nyanza and Western had 16 per cent, 8 per cent, and 6 per cent respectively with Nairobi having the least cases.

RISK FACTOR

The researchers led by Dr Menach Pyeko Owen, had studied 50 patients with cancer of the voice box called laryngeal carcinoma at KNH and linked about two thirds of cases to heavy use of tobacco or alcohol or both.

For this study Dr Owen had been feted in June with the Young Scientist of the Year Award in Seoul, Korea. But now they seem to have opened a Pandora’s Box.

The researchers said smoking was founding to be the biggest risk factor in developing voice box cancer but they found several discrepancies which they could not explain. “We noted that although the Coast had high prevalence of cigarette smoking there were not many cases of voice box cancer as one would have expected.”

A 2012 survey on drug use by the National Authority for the Campaign against Alcohol and Drug Abuse reported North Eastern to have the highest level of tobacco use followed by Nairobi, Central and then Eastern. Eastern had the highest use of tobacco among women.

The same survey showed Nairobi men lead in alcohol consumption followed by Central, North Eastern, Rift Valley, Coast, Eastern, Nyanza, and Western in that order.

The team cautiously suggests a genetic link between developing voice box cancer among the two closely related ethnic groups living in Central and Eastern.

“This is an area for further research since only 62 per cent cases of laryngeal carcinoma have been shown to be directly linked to tobacco and alcohol risk factors,” showed the study.

What the team is however sure of is that intensive tobacco use, for a long time-about a packet every day for 30 years is definitely courting this type of cancer. If such a smoker then doubles up as a heavy alcohol drinker then the chances of getting larynx cancer go higher.

CHILDREN SMOKING

While this cancer was found to develop mainly in elderly males, these were people who had started smoking in their early years. Now the researchers want measures put in place to reduce school or college age smokers.

“It is quite worrying that 13 per cent of schooling children smoke cigarettes, most of them males. If not checked, there is likelihood of increased cancer burden among this population,” read the report.

Starting to smoke early in life, the researchers said, has been shown to have a higher capacity to destroy the cell of the youngsters throats compared to what happens in adults.

Cancers of the throat, including that of the voice box, are the second most common in men after prostate cancer. They are also the third most common in women after cervix and breast cancer.

According to Ms Ann Korir, head of the Nairobi Cancer Registry at the Kenya Medical Research Institute, in 2012 cancers of the throat killed 1,692 men and 1,428 women in the country.

The International Centre for Cancer Research, an institute of the World Health Organisation, lists four main types of cancer that are common in Kenya. They include breast, cervix, prostrate and oesophageal cancers.