Self- Reported Personal and Family History of Cancers in Brunei Darussalam: Result of an Integrated Health Survey

INTRODUCTION: Cancers remain an important cause of mortality and morbidity, and overall incidence of cancers continues to increase worldwide with some cancers increasing while others decreasing. Understanding the epidemiology of cancer burden is important for health care planning. Most studies to date have reported incidence based on cancer registry. This aim of this study is to report the incidence of self-reported personal and family history of cancers. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Data on cancers were extracted from an anonymized database of a survey (Integrated Health Screening Survey) for civil servants conducted between 2008 and 2013 (N=21,437, mean age 40.61 ± 9.46 years old, men 45.1%). RESULTS: The overall incidence of self-reported cancers was 11.2%; personal and family histories were 0.6% and 9.4% respectively (1.2% did not state if cancers were either personal or family history). Commonly self-reported personal history of cancers were cancer of the breast, cervix and colorectal and for self-reported family history were cancers of the gastrointestinal tract, pulmonary, breast, head/neck and gynecological system. Common associations were with first degree relatives (single parent affected 50.8%, both parents affected 1.8%, siblings affected 21.9% and parents and siblings affected 3.1%). Involvement of grandparents accounted for 13.4%. The numbers affected ranged from one to three family members. For self-reported personal history of cancers, older age and gender were significant on univariate analysis and remained on multivariate analyses (p<0.05). For self–reported family history of cancers, older age, gender, professionals employment and smoking status were significant on univariate analysis but only older age, gender, race and professional employments remained significant factors on multivariate analyses (p<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Our study showed that more than one in nine of participants reported personal or family histories of cancers, and certain characteristics were predictive of self-reporting history of cancers. Associations of cancers were mainly with first degree relatives.