Smoking boosts skin cancer risk, Tampa study finds | Integrative ...

When asked what causes skin cancer, most Americans blame the sun. But more research is finding that cigarette smoking is another leading cause.

Researchers at the Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa looked at data from 698 subjects recruited from Florida medical clinics. They found that those who had skin cancer (not the mole kind), were more likely to have smoked than those who didn?t have skin cancer. This was particularly true for women, according to the study published in a recent issue of Cancer Causes Control.

The study was about half men and women, including 383 who had skin cancer and 315 who didn?t. Researchers asked participants about their smoking behaviors in terms of years smoked and number of cigarettes per day, or ?pack years.? Then they compared the relationship between cigarette smoking and the two most common types of skin cancer ? basal cell and squamous cell.

Among the group who had skin cancer, 66 percent had smoked, or two-thirds. Among those who did not have skin cancer, fewer than half had ever smoked. Results also showed that cigarette smoking was associated with a higher incidence of non-melanoma skin cancer overall, and that the risk increased with pack years.

Specifically, those who developed squamous cell cancer were twice as likely to have smoked 20 or more years compared to the control group. Women who developed squamous cell cancer were almost four times more likely than controls to have smoked for 20 or more years, said Dana E. Rollison, Ph.D., lead author and an associate member in the Moffitt Department of Cancer Epidemiology.

Skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in the United States, affecting one in five Americans in their lifetime. More research needs to be done to find out why women are more susceptible, but Rollison says it may be related to why female smokers have a higher risk of lung cancer than men.

Read more: http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2011-12-13/health/os-smoking-skin-cancer-20111213_1_skin-cancer-squamous-cell-incidence-of-non-melanoma-skin

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