Study: Prostate cancer trends in Canada, 1995 to 2012
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Released: 2016-04-25
In 2012, there were 21,105 new cases of prostate cancer diagnosed, representing 23.4% of all new cancer cases among men. Overall, prostate cancer accounted for 9.5% (3,708) of all cancer deaths among men in 2012.
The age-standardized incidence rate of prostate cancer has declined by an average of 3.8% per year since 2006. The annual rate of deaths due to prostate cancer has also fallen. From 1995 to 2012, the age-standardized prostate cancer mortality rate decreased by an average of 2.9% per year, a 40.9% decline over this period.
Men who were diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2012 tended to be younger than men who were diagnosed in 1995. During this time period, the median age at diagnosis for prostate cancer decreased from 71 to 67, while the median age of prostate cancer deaths increased from 78 to 82.
Chart 1
Age-standardized prostate cancer incidence and mortality rates, 1995 to 2012
Note to readers
Cancer incidence refers to the number of newly diagnosed cases of cancer. Cancer mortality refers to deaths attributed to cancer.
Age-standardized rates represent the number of new cancer cases or deaths per 100,000 men that would have occurred if the population under study had had the same age distribution as the given standard population. Age-standardization takes into account changes in the age distribution of the population and allows users to compare incidence or mortality rates over time.
The median refers to the midpoint of a distribution of numbers (for example, ages) sorted by size.
This release presents data from the Canadian Cancer Registry (CCR), a population-based database maintained by Statistics Canada. The CCR contains information on cases diagnosed from 1992 onward, compiled from reports from every provincial and territorial cancer registry.
This release also presents data from the Vital Statistics – Death Database, which collects demographic and cause of death information annually from all provincial and territorial vital statistics registries on all deaths in Canada.
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The article "Prostate cancer trends in Canada, 1995 to 2012" in Health at a Glance (82-624-X), is now available from the Browse by key resource module of our website under Publications.
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