武田 英雄, 上村 浩一, 佐野 雄二, 日吉 峰麗, 有澤 孝吉
四国医学雑誌 Vol.62(No.1,2) 49-54 2006年4月1日 査読有り
To clarify the characteristics of mortality in Tokushima Prefecture, the authors analyzed thestandardized mortality ratio(SMR)from 1993 to 1998 and 1999 to 2002. The sex-and 5-year-agespecificand cause-specific morality rates in Japan were used as the standard mortality, and thepopulation of sex-and 5-year-age-specific category in the census year(1995 and 2000)was used asthe population of Tokushima Prefecture. The 95 % confidence interva(l CI)of SMR was estimatedusing the exact method, on the assumption that the number of deaths followed the Poisson distribution.The mortality from all-cause in Tokushima Prefecture was significantly lower than that of theentire Japanese population among women during 1993-1998, while it was significantly higheramong men and women during 1999-2002. The SMRs of diabetes mellitus, bronchitis, emphysemaand asthma, and chronic hepatitis and liver cirrhosis were significantly higher than 100, with theSMR of diabetes being as high as 130-140. On the other hand, mortality rate from suicide was significantlylower than that of all of Japan. Regarding malignant neoplasms, morality rates fromcancers of all sites, esophagus, stomach, and colon and rectum were significantly lower than 100.However, the SMR of liver cancer was significantly high, suggesting that hepatitis C virus infectionwas endemic. The reason for the high mortality from diabetes should be clarified with regard toenvironmental and genetic factors, and the way of reporting diabetes as a cause of death in deathcertificates. In addition, the reason for the low mortality from cancers of the gastrointestinal tractremains unknown, and further investigations on life style factors are required.