Sixty-five percent of US patients with cancer survive 5 or more years after diagnosis, according to a recent analysis. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention undertook the study to monitor the country’s progress toward Healthy People 2020, a set of national health goals that includes a 71.1% survival rate 5 or more years after a cancer diagnosis.
The investigators examined 2011 national data from population-based cancer registries. About 1.5 million invasive cancers were reported that year, for an annual incidence rate of 451 cases per 100 000 people (Henley SJ et al. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep. 2015;64[9]:237-242). The most prevalent cancers were prostate, female breast, lung and bronchus, and colon and rectum. These cancers comprised half of cancer diagnoses in 2011. The 5-year relative survival rate was 97% for prostate cancer, 88% for breast cancer, 63% for colorectal cancer, and 18% for lung cancer.