Case control study for soft tissue sarcoma

The etiology of soft tissue sarcomas is largely unknown. For this study, which started in 1988 and still is in progress, information has been collected from individuals with soft tissue sarcomas and also from healthy controls. All patients, 15 years of age and older, diagnosed with soft tissue sarcoma (excluding those with tumors of the uterus) in southern Sweden have been identified from Southern Swedish regional tumor registry. Until 2009 there were 1261 individuals who were contacted and asked if they could answer a questionnaire. The questionnaire contained questions relating to past illnesses and medication, previous radiation therapy, occupation, height, weight, reproduction, use of oral contraceptives and other exposure to hormonal substances. Two controls per case were randomly selected from the population registry with matching criterias gender, age and place of residence. Of the 1261 identified cases, 967 (77%) responded to the questionnaire. After exclusion of some individuals due to misclassification 855 cases and 2021 controls remained. Due to the lack of available controls for 221 cases this resulted in 634 matched groups. Among these 17 (2.7%) included only one control. Consequently, the case-control series contained 634 cases and 1251 controls. This study is probably the largest soft tissue sarcoma case control study ever designed allowing risk factor studies of more seldom subtypes. Purpose: To study risk factors for soft tissue sarcoma Data collection is ongoing. In 2009, the study consisted of 634 cases.