Despite evidence that more young and middle-aged women are smoking, there is still time to avoid a major lung cancer epidemic among European women, a leading specialist said yesterday.
Indications that lung cancer is still relatively rare in European women does not mean, however, that effective interventions to reduce smoking among women should be delayed, according to Prof Peter Boyle of the European Institute of Oncology in Milan.
He was speaking at a preliminary meeting at the eighth World Conference on Lung Cancer, which is being staged over five days at University College Dublin and attended by specialists from 64 countries. It was opened last night by the President, Mrs Robinson.
Prof Boyle warned that current lung cancer rates reflected smoking habits over past decades, but do not necessarily reflect current patterns.
This was particularly true in the context of sustained increases in the numbers of young and middle-aged women smoking in many European countries. Lung cancer rates among these women differ significantly to the US where lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death among females.
"There is an interval of several decades between the change in smoking habits in a population and its effect in lung cancer rates. Thus, the observation that lung cancer is relatively rare in European women does not mean that efficacious interventions against smoking by women should be delayed."
Moreover, the lower cancer rates among European women and the observation that several years of smoking cessation reduces lung cancer risk "should, with adequate intervention, enable a major lung cancer epidemic in European women to be avoided", he said.
All lung cancer patients should be considered for chemotherapy as this treatment is increasingly shown to improve survival rates and, most importantly, quality of life for those with the disease, said Dr Des Carney, an oncologist at Dublin's Mater Hospital.
Many of the new drugs available can be safely given on an outpatient basis, he said.
This contrasted with five to 10 years ago when such treatment was frequently ruled out because the cancer was so advanced. Chemotherapy had improved to such an extent that it was now considered "patient-friendly".
Equally, where some patients in the past would not be considered for surgery because of their condition, chemotherapy now made surgery possible.
