Increasing rates of head melanoma

Figure 1.

The Age-standardized rate (ASR) of skin melanoma in the head region is increasing in Sweden.Before 1955 melanoma in the head region made up about half of all melanoma on the body, which wasquite natural since the head and face were the body parts most exposed to the UV radiation from the sun.But after 1955 the incidence of melanoma on areas normally not exposed to the sun started to increase bya factor of 20 from about 1/100 000 person years (py) in 1954 to around 20/100 000 py in year 2000. Atthe same time the face melanoma increased only by a factor of 2,4 from 0,5 up to 1,2. But after year 2000face and head melanoma is drastically increasing in Sweden, and as it looks, very much in parallel to theincreasing use of mobile phones (Figure 1).

Young or old people? Men or women?Figure 2.

Both old and young age groups of men have shown an increase of around 0,5/100 000 py sinceyear 2000.Actually, we can see that both young and old people are showing increasing rates of head melanoma, see