Secular Trends of Malignant Tumors of the Testis in White Men

Abstract

The incidence of malignant tumors of the testis in developed white populations varied sharply in space and time. The contemporary distribution has been bimodal, with high death rates in young adults and the elderly. About 1910, rates in the young were low and those in the elderly were higher than today. The age-specific trends were simply related to each other. In recent years the incidence and mortality rates have been similar in the U.S. white population, England and Wales, and Sweden. The rates for Denmark and Norway were substantially higher. The distribution of the tumors by age of the host and pathologic type was similar in these countries, in spite of the variation in incidence. The data showed that there are two major environmental etiologic factors in tumors of the testis, which suggested that the germinal cell tumors of the testis are derived at all ages from tissue predisposed in early life.