The study uses Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results program data from the San Francisco-Oakland (California) Metropolitan Statistical Area for the years 1974-1985 to study survival differences between blacks and whites while controlling for both stage and age at diagnosis.

“The site- and stage-specific survival curves for colon, male rectal, and prostate cancer, supplemented by proportional hazards analyses, indicate no significant stage-specific racial differentials. Stage-specific survival differences persist for male bladder, female rectal, and breast cancer. The relation between race and stage is more complex for female bladder, cervical, and uterine corpus cancer; for these sites, there is a racial difference at some stages but not for all.”

“Blacks usually have poorer survival than do whites regardless of the underlying cancer incidence pattern….Treatment may vary by race, leading to less favorable outcomes for blacks.”

“For female rectal, male bladder, and breast cancer survival, the results indicate significant racial components with relative hazards of 1.53 (p=0.0065), 1.81 (p<0.0001), and 1.42 (p<0.0001), respectively.”

“For cancer of the female rectum, male bladder, and breast, the differences remain when influences from stage are controlled, which implies that there may be differences in such factors as treatment, histology, and other potential influences on survival that result in higher case fatality among blacks.”