Young women get lung cancer at higher rates than men — docs don’t know why

Younger women are getting lung cancer at higher rates than men — and researchers can’t figure out why.

A report published Thursday in the journal JAMA Oncology showed that there is a gender disparity in lung cancer cases among people 35 to 54, with women being diagnosed at higher rates.

While the disparity is slim — one or two additional cases for every 100,000 women than among men — researchers at the American Cancer Society believe it’s a big enough discrepancy that it should be looked into.

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death among both men and women in the US, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Nationwide, about 197,000 people are diagnosed each year, and 136,000 die from the disease.

The study found that a higher incidence of lung cancer in women than in men has continued in those younger than 50, as well as extending to middle-aged adults as younger women with high risk for lung cancer get into older age.

Researchers are actively trying to figure out the reason behind the gender disparity, as well as the best way to help patients with this knowledge, but there doesn’t seem to be a direct answer.

Dr. Narjust Florez, a thoracic medical oncologist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, told the New York Times that despite the popular belief that lung cancer occurs the most in older men who have been smoking for a long time, hundreds of women are “dying of lung cancer in this country” every day.

Florez added that gender bias in the medical field could also affect testing, as women are less likely to be offered testing for lung cancer.

“I have women that have come with chest pressure and leave the office with Xanax,” she said. “And then when they start coughing up blood, that’s when somebody listens to them.”

The prevalence and intensity of smoking are not any higher in younger women than in men — besides a slightly higher prevalence for those born in the 1960s.

Additionally, findings showed no higher carcinogenic effects of cigarette smoking in women than in men, overdiagnosis is unlikely because it occurred in both early- and late-stage tumors, and occupational exposures such as asbestos have substantially reduced over the past decades, the study said.

“Further research is needed to elucidate reasons for the higher lung cancer incidence in younger women,” the authors wrote in the paper.

“Meanwhile, cigarette smoking cessation efforts should be intensified among younger and middle-aged women, and lung cancer screening encouraged among eligible women at both health care professional and community levels.”