INTRODUCTION: The author, who is a sole general practitioner in a Hungarian village, has continuously followed mortality in his practice for a long period of time. He found connections between cancer- and alcohol-related mortality in the first observational period between 1987 and 1999. Among men, cancer mortality related to alcoholism reached 50% in men and 7.9% in women. AIM: The aim of the author was to obtain new data on the relation between cancer- and alcohol-related mortality during a 12-year period between 2000 and 2011, and compare them with findings in his earlier work. METHOD: Data recorded in detailed death reports were analysed. For the main cause of death, long-term data from the medical history of patients were analysed thoroughly. RESULTS: Between 2000 and 2011 there were 326 cases of death (167 men and 159 women). Despite several changes in the structure of the cause of mortality (the frequency of alcohol-related deaths considerably decreased while the frequency of cancer-related deaths somewhat increased), the proportion of alcohol-related cancer mortality has increased to 60% in men and 9.1% in women. CONCLUSION: These data confirm earlier observation of the author showing that alcoholism is frequent in this Hungarian village and that it contributes to the high cancer mortality of the inhabitants, especially in men. Therefore, decreased alcohol consumption and alcohol-related harms would be an important step in cancer prevention.
INTRODUCTION: The author, who is a sole general practitioner in a Hungarian village, has continuously followed mortality in his practice for a long period of time. He found connections between cancer- and alcohol-related mortality in the first observational period between 1987 and 1999. Among men, cancer mortality related to alcoholism reached 50% in men and 7.9% in women. AIM: The aim of the author was to obtain new data on the relation between cancer- and alcohol-related mortality during a 12-year period between 2000 and 2011, and compare them with findings in his earlier work. METHOD: Data recorded in detailed death reports were analysed. For the main cause of death, long-term data from the medical history of patients were analysed thoroughly. RESULTS: Between 2000 and 2011 there were 326 cases of death (167 men and 159 women). Despite several changes in the structure of the cause of mortality (the frequency of alcohol-related deaths considerably decreased while the frequency of cancer-related deaths somewhat increased), the proportion of alcohol-related cancer mortality has increased to 60% in men and 9.1% in women. CONCLUSION: These data confirm earlier observation of the author showing that alcoholism is frequent in this Hungarian village and that it contributes to the high cancer mortality of the inhabitants, especially in men. Therefore, decreased alcohol consumption and alcohol-related harms would be an important step in cancer prevention.