Incidence and survival of sebaceous carcinoma in the United States

Abstract

Background: Information on risk factors, epidemiology, and clinical characteristics of sebaceous carcinoma (SC) is limited.

Objective: We sought to analyze trends in SC in the United States from 2000 through 2012.

Methods: We used data from the 18 registries of the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Program from 2000 to 2012 to calculate the cause of death, relative frequencies/incidences, 5-/10-year Kaplan-Meier survival, hazard ratios, and incidence rates for SC. Each parameter was analyzed by age, location of occurrence (ocular/extraocular), race, sex, and SEER registry.

Results: Overall incidence was 0.32 (male) and 0.16 (female) per 100,000 person-years. Incidence significantly increased, primarily because of an increase among men. Incidence among whites was almost 3 times the rate among non-whites. Male sex (P < .0001), black race (P = .01), and extraocular anatomic location (P < .0001) were associated with significantly higher all-cause mortality. However, overall case-specific mortality for SC decreased significantly.

Limitations: Underregistration of patients in SEER registries, lack of verification of individual diagnoses, and low levels of staging data because of low stage-classification rate are limitations.

Conclusions: The overall incidence of SC is increasing significantly. Male sex, black race, and extraocular occurrences are associated with significantly greater mortality.

Keywords: Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results; cutaneous; epidemiology; extraocular; incidence; mortality; ocular; sebaceous carcinoma; skin cancer; survival.