[Lung cancer cases reported in the annual of pathological autopsy cases in Japan (1958-1982), with special reference to the characteristics of lung cancer in Japan].

There were 28,303 male and 9,540 female cases of lung cancer cases, comprising 8.5% and 4.4% of the total autopsies and 16.4% and 9.0% of all malignancies, respectively. The most frequent fatal malignant tumors were gastric cancer and lung cancer in both male and female. The relative incidence of gastric cancer was found to be decreasing, while that of lung cancer has increased. The major histological types of lung cancer in the male were adenocarcinoma (34%), sq. cell ca. (33%), small cell ca. (13%), and large cell ca. (9%). As for the female, they were adenocarcinoma (55%), sq. cell ca. (18%), small cell ca. (10%), and large cell ca. (7%). The peak age-group of cancer occurrence shifted from 60 years to 70 years for most of the major histological types in both sexes. The male/female ratio of lung cancer cases was 3.0 in total. This study has pointed out that the male/female ratio by age-group in each country is a very good reflection of histological distribution.