Why was 2000 the earliest year of analysis in the preliminary report of the initial cancer cluster investigation?
The initial cancer cluster investigation by the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene started with the three census tracts that immediately surround Fort Detrick, Areas A and B. Data in the Maryland Cancer Registry contains census tract identification only for cases beginning in 2000. The reason to use census tracts is because census tracts are smaller areas than ZIP code areas and we know the population of the census tracts (the population is counted in each decennial census). Knowing the population at a given time allows us to compare the actual number of cases of cancer in the census tracts with the number expected, based on Frederick County and Maryland cancer rates. In future analyses, additional cases could be added from 1992-1999, but these do not have census tract data, and the analysis will require considerably more data processing or a much bigger geographic area (zip codes). Cases that occurred before 1992 are not in the Maryland Cancer Registry. An investigation of cases before 1992 would require an entirely different (and more difficult) approach from that of the preliminary analysis utilizing the Maryland Cancer Registry.

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1. What did the CDC’s Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) find in their 2009 Public Health Assessment?
2. Who is responsible for collecting information about cancer?
3. What is a cancer “cluster?”
4. How are cancer cluster concerns investigated in Maryland?
5. What is the relationship between cancer and environmental exposures?
6. What are the cancer rates in Frederick?
7. What was the scope of the preliminary cancer cluster investigation by the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DHMH)?
8. Why was 2000 the earliest year of analysis in the preliminary report of the initial cancer cluster investigation?
9. What were the preliminary findings of the DHMH cancer data analysis?
10. Is the risk of non-cancer health conditions being assessed?
11. If significant excess cancers are found in a specific geographic area within the county, then what?
12. Who can I talk to for more information?