Posted Sept 3, 2009
Hispanics run a greater risk of certain cancers depending on their heritage, a new University of Miami study shows.
In what’s considered the first-known review of cancer among Hispanic subpopulations, the study evaluated Florida’s diverse Hispanic population of Cubans, Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, and Central and South Americans. More than 30,000 cases, from 1999 to 2001, were reviewed.
The results showed that Mexicans had the lowest overall rates of cancer, while Puerto Ricans had the highest. Puerto Ricans and Cubans showed risks for diet-related cancers similar to that of non-Hispanic whites. Also, high incidences of illness happened among certain groups, including Cuban men and tobacco-related cancers, Puerto Rican men and liver cancer, and Mexican women and cervical cancer.
“Hispanics are not all the same with regard to their cancer experience,” lead researcher Paulo S. Pinheiro says of the results, published this month Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.
Anna Giuliano, chairwoman of Moffitt Cancer Center’s department of cancer epideiology and genetics, says in the past, national cancer data focused on predominately Mexican Hispanic populations in the American Southwest. Florida and New York, however, have a much more rich and diverse Hispanic community.
It’s estimated that nearly one in three people in the United States will be Hispanic by 2050.
Giuliano says this study points to the important genetic heritages of different Hispanic groups, which can help point researchers to a better understanding of curing cancer, Caribbean Hispanics, for example, have African roots, and Mexican Americans have ties to Native American traditions. The cancer risks in the study show that these groups reflect some of that genetic heritage.
The study also found that cancer risks are higher for Hispanics who live in the United States. For cancers as a whole, the risk was at least 40 percent higher among Hispanics living in the United States compared with those who live in their countries of origin.
For example, colorectal cancer risk among Cubans and Mexicans in the United States was more than double that in Cuba and Mexico. Similar results occurred when Mexican and Puerto Rican women in Florida were compared to their counterparts in native countries.
Giuliano says it appears that more healthful diets and lifestyles don’t immigrate to the United States. She wishes that diets — regardless of whether they are based in black beans or red beans — would continue in the Hispanic culture here in the United States.
“There’s a cultural tradition of eating that I think is very positive,” she says. “In the end, they will help keep you healthy, so don’t lose those traditions.”
Reporter Mary Shedden can be reated at (813) 259-7365.
Date: Aug 24, 2009
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