Estimating breast cancer incidence in Hispanic women in Connecticut, 1989-1991.

Abstract

The objective of this study was to estimate incidence rates for breast cancer, the most commonly occurring cancer in women, in the growing Hispanic population of Connecticut. The population-based Connecticut Tumor Registry (CTR) routinely obtains only limited information on Hispanic origin and maiden name. In this study, surnames of CTR breast cancer patients diagnosed in 1989-1991 were matched with a list of Spanish surnames. To assess misclassification, both surnames and maiden names (from death certificates) of female Connecticut residents who had died in 1989-1991 from any cause of death at 20 years of age and older were matched with the Spanish-surname list. Age-specific incidence rates (1989-1991) for 'Hispanic' women (with Spanish surname) were lower than those for 'non-Hispanic' white women (with non-Spanish surname) for age 35-39 years and older. Errors in these estimated rates were probably small because among decedents the number with a Spanish surname differed by only 9% from the number with a Spanish maiden name; false positives were almost balanced by false negatives. Matching of surnames in the cancer registry with a Spanish surname list provided reasonably accurate estimates of cancer incidence rates in Hispanic women, although individual women were misclassified as 'Hispanic' or 'non-Hispanic'.