DSHS to Evaluate New Flower Mound Cancer Data

News Release
April 7, 2014

The Texas Department of State Health Services will conduct an updated cancer analysis in Flower Mound, Texas, in response to community concerns and interest spurred by a recent environmental law study.

DSHS previously analyzed the occurrence of childhood and overall leukemia, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, childhood brain cancer and female breast cancer in Flower Mound using Texas Cancer Registry data from 1998 to 2007 and from 1999 to 2008. The findings showed that the incidence of all but breast cancer was within a statistically normal range. The agency found no evidence of a cancer cluster or evidence that the community was at higher risk for these types of cancers.

DSHS continued to collect cancer data from the area. An updated report will be released in June.

The updated analysis will use the most current data available and will again follow accepted scientific and statistical methods and be led by epidemiologists and cancer data experts. The number of individual cancer cases can fluctuate significantly from year to year, particularly with rarer cancers and in such small geographic areas.

Recent community interest was prompted in part by an article published in the Virginia Environmental Law Journal by a University of Texas at Austin faculty member.

DSHS is the agency responsible for state cancer cluster investigations and has conducted more than 400 cancer cluster investigations since 2000. The agency’s Texas Cancer Registry has more than 2 million records of cancer patients. It is the primary source of Texas cancer data and is the fourth-largest registry in the U.S. The Texas Cancer Registry was authorized by the Texas Legislature in 1989.

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(News Media Contact: Carrie Williams, DSHS Director of Media Relations, 512-776-7119)