• 11/23/2001
  • Reuters Health

Infection with Helicobacter pylori may increase the risk of developing larynx cancer, researchers from Turkey report.

Dr. Erdinc Aygenc of Ankara Numune Hospital and colleagues screened 26 laryngeal cancer patients and 32 cancer-free subjects for H. pylori infection. About 73% of patients with laryngeal cancer had H. pylori infection, the investigators found, while 41% of those without cancer were infected with the bacterium.

“This study suggests that H. pylori may be an initiator or promoter organism of [larynx cancer], but we cannot say that H. pylori is absolutely the causative agent,” the authors write in the November issue of the journal Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery. For example, they suggest, H. pylori may make laryngeal cells more susceptible to the effects tobacco and alcohol, which are associated with an increase risk of laryngeal cancer. According to the CDC, recent studies have shown an association between long-term H. pylori infection and the development of gastric cancer.

Cancer of the larynx is acommon type of cancer to occur in the head and neck. It is believed to have the same risk factors as oral cancer. Approximately 10,000 Americans will be diagnosed with the disease and roughly 4000 people will die from it in 2001.

Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg 2001;125:520-521.