Conservation of bladder function in patients with invasive bladder cancer treated by definitive irradiation and selective cystectomy.

Four hundred seventy patients with invasive bladder cancer treated by definitive irradiation (5000 rad or more) and selective systectomy were followed to assess their survival status and bladder function status. (90% were followed for at least 10 years or to death.) The survival rates for these patients were similar to those obtained in studies of preoperative irradiation with compulsory systectomy: 5 and 10 year survival rates were 38 and 22% respectively.

Breast cancer prognosis and the sex of the patient's children.

To verify a report that the prognosis of breast cancer was better in women whose first child was male, we analyzed the survival of 233 consecutive breast cancer patients diagnosed in 1969 and 1970 in terms of the sex of the first and last children, and of the number and proportion of males among the first four live births. No association between survival and any index of the sex of children was found. Similar negative findings for both survival and time to first recurrence were found in an independent series of 113 patients.

Risk factors for benign breast disease: a 30-year cohort study.

Data on the menstrual history, family history and degree of obesity of 1374 Vancouver nursing students were collected in 1945 and from 1947 to 1956. In 1979, 768 of these women were located; 726 (94%) responded and participated in a follow-up study, providing information on their subsequent medical history and on breast-related problems. No major differences were found between the early histories of these participants and those who were not located or did not respond.

Oestrogen receptors in breast tumours: associations with age, menopausal status and epidemiological and clinical features in 735 patients.

Comparisons between oestrogen-receptor (RE)-positive or negative patients were made on a continuous series of 735 patients with primary breast tumours seen at the major treatment centre in British Columbia between 1975 and 1978. RE positivity was commoner in older patients, and was not associated with menopausal status independently of age. The concentration of receptor protein also increased with increasing age, but was not affected by menopausal status.

Neuroblastoma: influence of age at diagnosis, stage, tumor site, and sex on prognosis.

A study of a consecutive series of 99 children with neuroblastoma seen at two major Toronto hospitals between 1951 and 1971 is reported. The children who were aged 24 months or less at diagnosis showed an overall two-year survival rate of 59 percent. Analysis, including fitting of a log-linear model, showed that increased probability of survival was associated with younger age at onset, nonadrenal site, and lower staging and the each of these factors acted independently.

A 10-year survey of eye injuries in Northern Ireland, 1967-76.

Ocular injuries of sufficient severity to necessitate admission to the Eye and Ear Clinic, Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast, were sustained by 1707 male patients and 325 female patients. Blunt injury occurred in 1063 eyes (49.2%), perforating injury in 1037 (48%), and intraocular or intraorbital foreign bodies in 181 eyes (8.

Delay in diagnosis and long-term survival in breast cancer.

The records of all 1591 women with a histologically confirmed primary breast neoplasm who received their primary treatment at the main referral centre in British Columbia and were diagnosed in the years 1945, 1950, 1955, 1960, 1965, 1970, or 1975 were reviewed. The interval from appearance of the first symptom to diagnosis decreased from 1945 to 1960, but no change was seen from 1960 to 1975. An analysis of survival from the date of first symptom showed that long-term survival was greater in patients with a shorter delay between the appearance of symptoms and diagnosis.

Cancer mortality among Chinese, Japanese, and Indians in British Columbia, 1964-73.

We compared age-adjusted mortality rates for cancer of selected sites for Chinese, Japanese, and native Indian residents of British Columbia during the years 1964-73 to the corresponding rates for the white population. Mortality from all cancers of the Chinese did not differ significantly from that of whites. Elevated rates are seen for cancer of the nasopharynx in both sexes, of the liver and esophagus in males, and of the lung in females.

Examining survival data.

This brief review presents a nonmathematical description of the methods used to describe the outcome of patient groups when the time to an event such as death or disease recurrence is of interest. Calculation of the product-limit, actuarial and relative survival curves is described and the underlying principles are explained. Two statistical tests frequently used in comparing survival curves (the generalized Wilcoxon and the log-rank or Mantel test) are described and an example of their use is given.

Investigation of a family suspected of being at high risk for cancer.

The investigation of the family of a patient with bilateral breast cancer is described. By means of interviews and the checking of hospital records and death certificates, information was obtained on 199 family members over five generations, 19 of whom had cancer. Comparison with expected numbers of cases showed an excess in only one generation.

The design of clinical trials comparing pi-meson therapy with conventional radiotherapy.

Comparative clinical trials of pi-meson therapy for several tumor sites will be performed in Vancouver using the TRIUMF facility. The design of these trials poses some particular problems related to the limited numbers of patients available. In this paper, some principles of study design are set forth and applied to the issue of randomised and non-randomised designs in general, and to the pi-meson trials in particular.

Contrasting effects of maternal fertility and birth rank on the occurrence of neural tube defects.

The relationships between the occurrence of anencephalus and spina bifida, sibship size and birth rank were examined, using linked records for births in British Columbia. Comparison of 414 sibships in which at least one infant had a neural tube defect with 1362 randomly chosen unaffected sibships showed that the affected sibships were larger. There were both more births than expected after the affected birth, and shorter intervals between births before the affected birth.

Maternal and environmental factors affecting twin births in Canadian cities.

Details of 4972 pairs of twins born to mothers resident in 14 large Canadian cities in the years 1952, 1957, 1962, and 1967 were compared to those of a random sample of 4969 single births. Both dizygotic and monozygotic twinning rates, derived by Weinberg's formula, showed increases with both maternal age and with the number of previous livebirths. Dizygotic twinning rates also showed a seasonal variation with an October maximum.

Epidemiology of endometrial cancer.

For a population-based, case-control study of cancer of the endometrium in Greater Boston from 1965 through mid-1969, 440 cases were drawn from nearly all hospitals in the area; controls were drawn at random from the general population. The age-adjusted incidence rate was 18.1/100,000 woman-years, with a peak at ages 55-59 and a gradual decline thereafter.