Case-control study of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma

成人非霍奇金S淋巴瘤是近年来增长最快的癌症之一。全球所有年龄段的男性和女性都出现了这一上升趋势。大部分上涨的原因尚不清楚。最近有人提出，这种激增的部分原因可能是同一时期发生的阳光暴露量的增加。有一些间接证据支持这一假设。例如，澳大利亚更接近赤道的非霍奇金淋巴瘤的发病率比英格兰和威尔士更高，在维多利亚的英国移民中被诊断为非霍奇金淋巴瘤的频率比在他们的祖国更高。阳光假说将通过比较1998-2001年间诊断为非霍奇金淋巴瘤的塔斯马尼亚人和没有患上这种疾病的塔斯马尼亚人的阳光暴露模式来检验。之所以选择塔斯马尼亚，是因为除了夏季外，那里的紫外线辐射水平都很低，接近布里斯班、悉尼和墨尔本的水平。因此，在塔斯马尼亚，紫外线暴露最多的人和暴露最少的人之间存在着更大的差异，这使得它成为检验这一假设的理想地点。还将研究非霍奇金淋巴瘤与皮肤黑色素沉着的一种衡量标准之间的联系。非霍奇金淋巴瘤在肤色较浅的民族中的发病率高于生活在同一纬度的肤色较深的人群，但目前尚不清楚高加索人群中的风险是否有所不同。霍巴特的孟席斯人口健康研究中心开发的一种新的皮肤黑色素测量方法，将更好地研究肤色的影响。

Adult non-Hodgkin?s lymphoma (NHL) is one of the most rapidly increasing cancers of recent times. The rise has occurred worldwide in men and women of all ages. The reason for most of the rise is unknown. It has recently been proposed that part of the upsurge may be due to increases in sun exposure which have occurred during the same period. There is some indirect evidence to support this hypothesis. For example, the rate of occurrence of NHL is higher closer to the equator in Australia than it is in England and Wales, and NHL is diagnosed more frequently among British migrants to Victoria than it is in their homeland. The sunlight hypothesis will be tested by comparing the pattern of sun exposure in Tasmanians diagnosed with NHL during the years 1998-2001 and in a sample of Tasmanians without the disease. tasmania has been chosen because levels of ultraviolet (UV) radiation are low there in all but the summer months, when it approaches the levels of Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. There is therefore a greater difference in UV exposure between the most exposed and the least exposed in Tasmania, making it an ideal location to test the hypothesis. The link between NHL and a measure of melanin pigmentation in the skin will also be studied. The incidence of NHL is higher in lighter-skinned ethnic groups than it is in darker-skinned people living at the same latitude, but it is not known whether risk varies within Caucasian populations. A new measure of melanin in the skin, developed at the Menzies Centre for Population Health Research in Hobart, will better allow the effects of skin colour to be studied.