Since the Rigoni-Stern´s early epidemiological study on the frequency of marriage in relation to risk of both uterine and breast cancers was first published in 1842, a great deal has been known about the epidemiology of cancer of cervix, at least, in Western world.
However, in most of the less developed countries where the incidence of cervical cancer is still high, there have not been many studies done on the epidemiological characteristics of this cancer in their own females, and Korea is not an exception.
Incidence of cervical cancer can only be obtained from a small county where an experimental community-based cancer registry has been established since 1983, and there have been only several clinical and epidemiological observations that have tested some known risk factors.
This paper summerizes the cervical cancer occurrence in Korea and the risk factors studied in those clinical and epidemiological observ-ations.
Several points specifically mentioned here are as follows:
1. Incidence rate of cervical cancer in Korean females is expected to be in between 20 to 30 per 100,000 women, and the highest incidence is observed in the age of 50s.
2. Mortality rate of cervical cancer is estimated to be 7 per 100, 000 which gives a total number of death due to cervical cancer as approximately 1,400 a year. This campares the mortality rate of 3 per 100, 000 in the American women. This difference, reflects the cancer screening status and the treatment in both countries.
3. Some of the risk factors that have been hypothesized in the Western world have been suspected as risk factors in Korean women too.
4. Most of the Korean cervical cancer patients visit the hospital at their late stages and this situation seems to be related to the high detection rate in cervical cancer screening in Korea.
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