Cigs and drink increase pancreatic cancer risk

It's long been known that smoking is a risk factor for developing pancreatic cancer, a disease that is rarely caught early and has a grim prognosis.

Only about five of every 100 people diagnosed with the cancer are alive five years later.

The evidence on heavy drinking has been mixed, but some studies have suggested it's also a risk. The new results, which appeared in the American Journal of Gastroenterology, show the disease may strike both smokers and drinkers earlier in life.

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"If you do have these habits, and you're going to develop pancreatic cancer, the age of presentation may be younger," said lead researcher Michelle Anderson, at the University of Michigan Health System in Ann Arbor.

Her team also found that the effect disappeared for smokers and drinkers if they had quit 10 years or more before diagnosis.

On average, the risk of developing pancreatic cancer is about one in 71, and the average age at diagnosis is 72.

But in this study, smokers and heavy drinkers were diagnosed a decade earlier.

The findings are based on 811 patients in a pancreatic cancer registry. Those who were current smokers were typically diagnosed at around age 62. Heavy drinkers, meanwhile, were typically diagnosed at age 61, almost a decade earlier than non-drinkers.

The findings do not prove that smoking or drinking led to the earlier cancers, but Anderson's team did account for a number of other factors, such as body weight and family history of pancreatic cancer.

hnews@herald.ie