Upper aero digestive tract cancers: epidemiological and histopathological aspects in Togo

Background: The objective of the study was to describe the epidemiological and histopathological aspects of cancer of the upper aero digestive tract (UAT) in a reference service in Togo.

Methods: It was a retrospective study about UAT cancers diagnosed in the ENT and maxillofacial surgery department of Sylvanus Olympio Teaching Hospital of Lomé in Togo from 1st January 2005 to 31 December 2014, or a period of 10 years.  

Results: The UAT cancers represented 0.3% of consultations and 64.8% of head and neck cancers. The average age of patients was 51.3 years (± 16.5) with extremes of 3 months and 86 years. The sex ratio was 1.77. Chronic smoking was found in 26.4% of patients with 1.6% of women; that of chronic alcoholism among 43.8% of which 7.7% of women and the simultaneous alcoolotabagisme in 20.9% of patients. The UAT cancers were dominated by cancers of the oral cavity (36.2%) with particularly a female predominance (53.2%), followed by the oropharynx (18.5%) and the larynx (18.1%). The squamous cell carcinoma was predominant in UAT cancers (83.5%) followed by non-Hodgkin lymphoma (8.9%) and adenocarcinoma (2.7%).

Conclusions: UAT cancers are the largest contingent of head and neck cancers in Togo. They occur most often in men from the fifties but there are a high proportion of women. Histology is dominated by squamous cell carcinoma.