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. 2014:2014:832573.
doi: 10.1155/2014/832573. Epub 2014 Apr 28.

Clusters of adolescent and young adult thyroid cancer in Florida counties

Raid Amin  1 , James J Burns  2
Affiliations

Clusters of adolescent and young adult thyroid cancer in Florida counties

Raid Amin et al. Biomed Res Int. 2014.

Abstract

Background: Thyroid cancer is a common cancer in adolescents and young adults ranking 4th in frequency. Thyroid cancer has captured the interest of epidemiologists because of its strong association to environmental factors. The goal of this study is to identify thyroid cancer clusters in Florida for the period 2000-2008. This will guide further discovery of potential risk factors within areas of the cluster compared to areas not in cluster.

Methods: Thyroid cancer cases for ages 15-39 were obtained from the Florida Cancer Data System. Next, using the purely spatial Poisson analysis function in SaTScan, the geographic distribution of thyroid cancer cases by county was assessed for clusters. The reference population was obtained from the Census Bureau 2010, which enabled controlling for population age, sex, and race.

Results: Two statistically significant clusters of thyroid cancer clusters were found in Florida: one in southern Florida (SF) (relative risk of 1.26; P value of <0.001) and the other in northwestern Florida (NWF) (relative risk of 1.71; P value of 0.012). These clusters persisted after controlling for demographics including sex, age, race.

Conclusion: In summary, we found evidence of thyroid cancer clustering in South Florida and North West Florida for adolescents and young adult.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
SaTScan purely spatial Poisson analysis for clustering using county data adjusting for age, sex, race as covariates based on data from Florida Cancer Data System (FCDS) cancer registry for thyroid cancer in adolescents and young adults (AYA) 2000–2008. Primary cluster is shown in crosshatched label and contains the South Florida (SF) counties of Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm-Beach (relative risk 1.26; P value < 0.001). Secondary cluster is shown in simple hatched label and contains the northwest (NWF) county of Okaloosa (relative risk 1.71; P value = 0.012).
Figure 2
Figure 2
SaTScan purely spatial Poisson analysis for females, adjusted for age and race, for thyroid cancer in adolescents and young adults (AYA) 2000–2008. Primary cluster is shown in crosshatched label and contains the South Florida (SF) counties of Miami-Dade and Broward (relative risk = 1.25, P value < 0.001). Secondary cluster is shown in simple hatched label and contains the northwest (NWF) county of Okaloosa (relative risk 1.88, P value = 0.003).
Figure 3
Figure 3
Increasing overall incidence of thyroid cancer in AYA 2000–2008.
Figure 4
Figure 4
FleXScan purely spatial analysis for thyroid cancer in adolescents and young adults (AYA) 2000–2008. Primary cluster is shown in crosshatched label and contains seven South Florida (SF) counties including Miami-Dade, Palm Beach, Broward, Okeechobee, Monroe, Polk, and Glades (relative risk = 1.14, P value = 0.001). Secondary cluster found in Santa Rosa and Okaloosa counties (relative risk 1.77, P value = 0.001). Note that this differs from SaTScan analysis because the scanning window in FleXScan can vary in shape, whereas SaTScan is either circular or elliptical.
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