International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health | May 2019 | Vol 6 | Issue 5 Page 1 International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health Patel NM et al. Int J Community Med Public Health. 2019 May;6(5):xxx-xxx http://www.ijcmph.com pISSN 2394-6032 | eISSN 2394-6040 Original Research Article Prevalence of cancer among the urban and rural community of Surendranagar district, Gujarat Nitesh M. Patel 1 , Pratik K. Jasani 1 *, Girija P. Kartha 1 , Sweta N. Patel 2 INTRODUCTION Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are biggest killers in the world which include cardiovascular diseases, cancers, chronic respiratory diseases and diabetes. Cancer is among the most common causes of mortality in developing countries. 1 At present, various types of non- communicable diseases are also known as modern day epidemics. Among these modern epidemics, cancer is the second most common cause of mortality in developed countries. Cancer is defined as abnormal growth of cell. It can affect any tissue or organ of body. 2 Cancer is not only one, but many diseases. There are over 100 different known cancers that affect humans. 3 Developed and developing countries shares the unequal burden of cancer. Each particular type of cancer exhibits different patterns of distribution. 4 Male predominance of lung cancer is the most observable feature of the distribution of cancers between the sexes. Among men, the five most common sites of cancers diagnosed were lung, Prostate, colorectal, stomach and liver respectively. Most common cancer site among female was breast followed by colorectal, cervix, uteri, lung and stomach. 5 ABSTRACT Background: Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are mainly cardiovascular diseases, cancers, chronic respiratory diseases and diabetes-are the world’s biggest killers. In developing countries, cancer is among the ten most common causes of mortality. Cancer is not just one disease but many diseases. There are more than 100 different types of cancer. The most conspicuous feature of the distribution of cancers between the sexes is the male predominance of lung cancer. Prostate, colorectal, stomach and liver cancer are also much more common in males. Cancer of breast, colorectal, cervix, uteri, lung and stomach are common in females. This study was conducted to identify the prevalence of various types of cancers in rural and urban community of Surendranagar district. Methods: It was a cross-sectional study carried out among 300 rural and 300 urban families selected by simple random sampling. Data was collected and analysed by Statistical Package for Social Sciences and Microsoft Excel have been used to generate graphs, tables, etc. Results: Study revealed that out of total study population (2053), 37 participants were having cancer. The prevalence of cancer was 1.80% in our study. Out of 37 respondents who were having cancer, majority cases were oral cancer 11 (29.73%) and 9 (24.32%) lung cancer, followed by cancer breast 5 (13.51%), cancer colorectal 5 (13.51%) and other cancers 7 (18.92%). Conclusions: Prevalence of cancer was increasing with the age. Higher number of cancer cases was found amongst older age than younger age. Significant difference was found between cancer prevalence and gender. Keywords: Prevalence, NCDs, Cancer, Gender 1 Department of Community Medicine, C.U. Shah Medical College, Surendranagar, Gujarat, India 2 Shanku Medicity Hospital, Mehsana, Gujarat, India Received: 11 March 2019 Accepted: 28 March 2019 *Correspondence: Dr. Pratik K. Jasani, E-mail: pkjas007@gmail.com Copyright: © the author(s), publisher and licensee Medip Academy. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License, which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18203/2394-6040.ijcmph20191452