Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2016 Apr;79(2):58-69.
doi: 10.4046/trd.2016.79.2.58. Epub 2016 Mar 31.

Epidemiology of Lung Cancer in Korea: Recent Trends

Ji Young Park  1 , Seung Hun Jang  2
Affiliations
Review

Epidemiology of Lung Cancer in Korea: Recent Trends

Ji Young Park et al. Tuberc Respir Dis (Seoul). 2016 Apr.

Abstract

Lung cancer causes the most cancer deaths in Korea. Although the smoking rate has begun to decrease, the prevalence of lung cancer is still increasing. We reviewed the national lung cancer registry data and the data published about lung cancer in Korea. In 2012, the crude incidence rate of lung cancer was 43.9 per 100,000. The age-standardized mortality rate of lung cancer was 19.8 per 100,000. The 5-year relative survival rate for lung cancer was 11.3% from 1993 to 1995 and increased to 21.9% in the period from 2008 to 2012. Lung cancer occurring in never-smokers was estimated to increase in Korea. Adenocarcinoma is steadily increasing in both women and men and has replaced squamous cell carcinoma as the most common type of lung cancer in Korea. In patients with adenocarcinoma, the frequency of EGFR mutations was 43% (range, 20%-56%), while that of the EMK4-ALK gene was less than 5%.

Keywords: Incidence; Korea; Lung Neoplasms; Mortality; Prevalence; Survival.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of Interest: No potential conflict of interest relevant to this article was reported.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Trends in crude rates and age-standardized lung cancer incidence rates in the Korean population from 1999 to 2012. (A) Overall. (B) Men. (C) Women. Source: Annual report of cancer statistics in Korea in 2012 (Korea Central Cancer Registry, 2015).
Figure 2
Figure 2. Trends in histological type of lung cancer and age-standardized smoking rates in Korea. (A) Overall. (B) Men. (C) Women. Source: Annual report of cancer statistics in Korea in 2012 (Korea Central Cancer Registry, 2015); Korean Statistical Information Service (Statistics Korea, 2015).
Figure 3
Figure 3. Mortality trends for lung cancer in the Korean population. (A) Number of deaths. (B) Crude mortality rates. (C) Age-standardized mortality rates. Source: Korean Statistical Information Service (Statistics Korea, 2015).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Global Burden of Disease Cancer Collaboration. Fitzmaurice C, Dicker D, Pain A, Hamavid H, Moradi-Lakeh M, et al. The global burden of cancer 2013. JAMA Oncol. 2015;1:505–527. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Korea Central Cancer Registry. Annual report of cancer statistics in Korea in 2012 [Internet] Goyang: National Cancer Information Center; 2015. [cited 2015 Mar 31]. Available from: http://www.cancer.go.kr/
    1. In KH, Kwon YS, Oh IJ, Kim KS, Jung MH, Lee KH, et al. Lung cancer patients who are asymptomatic at diagnosis show favorable prognosis: a Korean Lung Cancer Registry Study. Lung Cancer. 2009;64:232–237. - PubMed
    1. Park JH, Lee KS, Choi KS. Burden of cancer in Korea during 2000-2020. Cancer Epidemiol. 2013;37:353–359. - PubMed
    1. World DataBank. World development indicators [Internet] Washington, DC: The World Bank Group; 2015. [cited 2015 Nov 11]. Available from: http://databank.worldbank.org/ddp/home.dohttp://databank.worldbank.org/ddp/home.do.