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Risk of betel chewing for oesophageal cancer in Taiwan
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  • Short Communication
  • Open access
  • Published: 28 August 2001

Risk of betel chewing for oesophageal cancer in Taiwan

  • M-T Wu1,2,3,
  • Y-C Lee4,
  • C-J Chen5,
  • P-W Yang4,
  • C-J Lee4,
  • D-C Wu6,
  • H-K Hsu7,
  • C-K Ho2,3,
  • E-L Kao8 &
  • …
  • J-M Lee4 

British Journal of Cancer volume 85, pages 658–660 (2001)Cite this article

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Abstract

Among 104 cases of squamous-cell oesophageal carcinoma patients and 277 controls in Taiwan, after adjusting for cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption, and other confounders, we found that subjects who chewed from 1 to 495 betel-year and more than 495 betel-years (about 20 betel quid per day for 20 years) had 3.6-fold (95% Cl = 1.3–10.1) and 9.2-fold risk (95% Cl = 1.8–46.7), respectively, of developing oesophageal cancer, compared to those who did not chew betel. © 2001 Cancer Research Campaign www.bjcancer.com

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  • 16 November 2011

    This paper was modified 12 months after initial publication to switch to Creative Commons licence terms, as noted at publication

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Environmental Health and Occupational Medicine, National Health Research Institutes, Kaohsiung, Taiwan

    M-T Wu

  2. Department of Occupational Medicine, Kaohsiung Medical University Hospital, Kaohsiung, Taiwan

    M-T Wu & C-K Ho

  3. Graduate Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, Kaohsiung Medical University, Taiwan

    M-T Wu & C-K Ho

  4. Department of Surgery, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan

    Y-C Lee, P-W Yang, C-J Lee & J-M Lee

  5. Graduate Institute of Epidemiology, College of Public Health, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan

    C-J Chen

  6. Department of Gastroenerology, Kaohsiung Medical University Hospital, Kaohsiung, Taiwan

    D-C Wu

  7. Department of Chest Surgery, Kaohsiung Veterans General Hospital, Kaohsiung, Taiwan

    H-K Hsu

  8. Department of Chest Surgery, Kaohsiung Medical University Hospital, Kaohsiung, Taiwan

    E-L Kao

Authors
  1. M-T Wu
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  2. Y-C Lee
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  6. D-C Wu
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  8. C-K Ho
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  10. J-M Lee
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to M-T Wu or J-M Lee.

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From twelve months after its original publication, this work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/

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Cite this article

Wu, MT., Lee, YC., Chen, CJ. et al. Risk of betel chewing for oesophageal cancer in Taiwan. Br J Cancer 85, 658–660 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1054/bjoc.2001.1927

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  • Received: 15 December 2000

  • Revised: 28 March 2001

  • Accepted: 27 April 2001

  • Published: 28 August 2001

  • Issue date: 31 August 2001

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1054/bjoc.2001.1927

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Keywords

  • oesophageal cancer
  • squamous-cell carcinoma
  • betel

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