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Old Friday, November 09, 2007
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Default Factors influencing brain tumour

In most cases,causes of brain tumour are not known.but they are not infectious. You can't 'catch' a brain tumour. There are a few risk factors that is known.

How common are brain tumours?
Brain tumours are relatively rare. In the UK, just over 4,100 people were diagnosed with a brain tumour in 2003. Including tumours of the spinal cord, there were about 4,300 diagnosed in the UK in 2003. That means that about 16 out of every 1,000 cancers diagnosed in the UK are in the brain or spinal cord (or 1.6%).

Brain tumours are slightly more common in men than in women. But one type, meningioma, is slightly more common in women.

Age
People can get brain tumours at any age. Generally speaking they get more common the older you get, as do many other types of cancer. But there are many different types of brain tumours and some are more common in younger adults. Overall, more brain tumours are diagnosed than in the past. But this is mostly because we are living longer and brain tumours are more common in older people.

About 300 children are diagnosed with brain tumours in the UK each year. Because cancer as a whole is so rare in children, brain tumours are still the commonest type of childhood cancer.

Genetic conditions/family history
Up to 5 out of every 100 brain tumours (5%) are related to known genetic conditions. If you have one of these syndromes, you are more likely to get a brain tumour. These syndromes cause a number of different medical problems and you may already know if any one of these runs in your family. Examples are neurofibromatosis type 1 and 2, tuberous sclerosis, Li-Fraumeni or Von Hippel Lindau syndrome. If you have a parent, brother or sister diagnosed with a tumour of the nervous system, your risk is approximately double that of other people. Jewish people have a higher risk of meningiomas than other groups, which may be due to genetic factors.

Radiation
In our environment, the only definite risk we know of is exposure to radioactivity (ionising radiation). Meningiomas and malignant gliomas are more common in people who have had radiotherapy to the head in the past. There is known to be a slightly increased risk of brain tumours in children who have had radiotherapy to the head as a treatment for acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL). The risk is highest if the radiotherapy was given before the age of five. Modern radiotherapy techniques are less likely to cause brain tumours than the old style of giving a single high dose. The risk of a brain tumour is increased if some chemotherapy drugs called 'anti-metabolites' are given at the same time as the radiotherapy to the head. For this reason, chemotherapy and radiotherapy are no longer always given together to children with ALL.

Other medical conditions
Children with cerebral palsy have a slightly increased risk of getting a brain tumour. There is evidence that people with food or respiratory allergies have a slightly reduced risk of brain tumours, although it is not clearly understood why this should be. People with autoimmune conditions such as diabetes may also have a reduced risk.

Weakened immunity
A rare type of brain tumour called primary cerebral lymphoma is more likely to develop in people who have an immune system that does not work properly. They may be taking drugs to dampen their immune systems because they have had an organ transplant. Or they may have AIDS. Even in these groups of people, cerebral lymphoma is still rare.

Other possible causes
Many other possible causes have been investigated, but none of these have been proved. People who work in the following industries may have an increased risk of brain tumour from the chemicals they are exposed to.


Oil refining
Rubber manufacture
Drug manufacture
Chemists
Embalmers
In petrol stations
The textile industry
It is thought that female hormones may affect brain tumour development. Three studies have shown that women whose periods started before the age of 12 have a slightly lower risk of glioma than women whose periods started after the age of 14. More research is needed though to find out the exact role of hormones.

Long-term use of brown permanent hair dye slightly increased the risk of gliomas in one study but more research is needed to confirm this.

Two Chinese studies have shown an increased risk of brain tumours in children of women working in the textiles industry and the electronics industry or either parent working in the agricultural industry. It is not yet known which factors may be responsible for the increased risk, so more research is needed to find out.

Children who have a larger head circumference at birth and higher birth weight have a slightly higher risk of childhood brain tumours.

Certain viruses
Power lines
Or mobile phones
cause brain tumours, but we have included this information because people ask about them. They are all being looked into. But at the moment we just don't know whether they increase the risk or not.


Mobile phones
Mobile phones are being investigated to see how much low level (non ionising) radiation they produce. From the evidence we have so far, we still can't say that mobile phones pose a problem to health. A review conducted by the journal Bandolier found no convincing evidence that mobile phone use was linked to any cancer in the head. But the review concluded that we cannot know what the long term effects are as yet. A large international study is looking into long term use of mobile phones. A large UK study reported in January 2006 that they could find no link between mobile phone use and glioma. The study included information on over 2,500 people. They found no link between the amount of mobile phone use, length of time since first use, lifetime years of use or number of calls made. The study did not include any information on children using mobile phones.

Two other European studies have since reported that the risk of glioma may double in people who have used a mobile for more than 10 years. But these were much smaller studies than the UK research, so the results may not be as reliable. Do remember that brain tumours are rare, so while a potential doubling of the risk may sound frightening, it is still a relatively small risk. Even more recently, in December 2006, a very large Danish study (of over 400,000 people) looked at people in their study who had used a mobile phone for more than 10 years. They found there was no increased risk of brain tumour.

The Government's advisory group advises that we use mobile phones for as short a time as possible and preferably with a hands free kit. The chairman of the Government's advisory group, Sir William Stewart, says that children should only use mobile phones in an emergency. There is no evidence that mobile phones are damaging to children either. But if mobile phone use does turn out to have health risks, children would be more at risk because

They are young
Their nervous systems are still developing
Their skulls are thinner
So, children are advised not to use mobiles regularly if they are under 16. If you are concerned, the Health Protection Agency Radiation Protection Division have some useful information on mobile phones that you may find helpful.

Remember - the most dangerous thing about mobile phones is that people use them when they are driving! You have 4 times the risk of having an accident if you are talking on the phone when driving - and hands free kits don't seem to be any safer as far as driving accidents are concerned. It is against the law to talk on a mobile phone while driving.
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