Women younger than 50 years with endometrial cancer.

PURPOSE OF INVESTIGATION: The purpose of the study was to evaluate if known risk factors for endometrial cancer in menopausal women are also related to endometrial cancer in younger ages.

METHODS: Eighty-one patients with a mean age of 46.3 years diagnosed with endometrial cancer (EC) (histologically confirmed) from January of 1992 to December of 2004 were included in the study. The EC group of patients was compared with 100 patients (control group) randomly selected from the gynecologic clinic (inclusion criteria: age 43-48 years) without any endometrial cancer diagnoses that were evaluated for the same factors.

RESULTS: Mean BMI was 34.4 kg/m2 (SD = 8.8) in the first group and 28.3 (SD = 7.6) in the second one (p < 0.001). None of the women in the EC group reported any history of oral contraception. With the exception of hypertension and ovarian cancer (probably related to small numbers) all other comparisons were statistically significant (although some only marginally).

DISCUSSION: From the results of our study, it seems that body mass index (BMI), parity, type of menstrual cycles, history of polycystic ovarian (PCO) syndrome and diabetes are possibly related to endometrial cancer in women younger than 50 years of age, and the strongest relation was found with increased BMI. Also, there was no increased incidence of hypertensive disease in the EC group.

CONCLUSION: Prospective studies are needed for final conclusions.