Escalating cancer mortality in ILD patients: insights from a US population study

Sep 22, 2026

Background: Interstitial Lung Diseases (ILD) may increase cancer risk across organ systems, yet cancer-related mortality data in ILD patients are limited. This study analyzes cancer-related mortality among ILD decedents across the United States. Methods: Using the CDC multiple cause-of-death database, age-adjusted mortality rates were stratified by gender, race, state, and cancer categories from 1999–2019, with transport injury mortality as control.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages10

Reading Time25 min

AccessFree to download

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Vaezi etal. BMC Pulmonary Medicine (2026) 26:308 BMC Pulmonary Medicine [https://doi.org/10.1186/s12890-026-04345-5](https://doi.org/10.1186/s12890-026-04345-5) RESEARCH Open Access Escalating cancer mortality in ILD patients: insights from a US population study Atefeh Vaezi1, Berkay Dincer1, Rabi Bhatta2, Vaibhava Sakilam2, Roy Chang2,3, Pankit Patel1, Tracy Ashby1 and Mehdi Mirsaeidi2* Abstract Background Emerging evidence suggests that Interstitial Lung Diseases (ILD) may be associated with a higher risk of cancer in various organ systems compared to the general population. However, epidemiological data on cancerrelated mortality in ILD patients remain largely unexamined. We aimed to provide a comprehensive analysis of cancerrelated mortality in decedents with ILD across the United States. Methods We utilized the multiple cause-of-death database provided by CDC, and we analyzed ILD-cancer related Age-Adjusted Mortality Rates (AAMR) stratified by gender, race, state of death, and cancer categories from 1999 to 2019. Transport injury-related mortality was used as a control group. We also analyzed the annual trends of mortality using Average Annual Percent Change (AAPC) . Results Between 1999 and 2019, a total of 511,176 ILD patients died, with 50,333 (9 . 85%) concurrently diagnosed with some form of cancer. During this period, the ILD-cancer related AAMR increased by 8 . 2%, rising from 11.415 to 12.347 per 1,000,000 . Decedents with ILD had 23-fold higher odds of having cancer recorded as a cause of death compared to the control group. Conclusions Our results suggest that cancer-related mortality is higher in decedents with ILD compared to the control group, with an upward trend observed over the 21-year study period, contrasting with the declining cancer mortality seen in the United States. These findings underscore the need for future prospective studies to determine whether targeted screening and follow-up interventions may benefit this high-risk group. Keywords Interstitial Lung Disease, Malignancy, Mortality, Cause of Death *Correspondence: Mehdi Mirsaeidi [mehdi.mirsaeidi@austin.utexas.edu](mehdi.mirsaeidi@austin.utexas.edu) 1Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine, College of Medicine-Jacksonville, University of Florida, Jacksonville, FL 32209, USA 2Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine, Dell School of Medicine, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA 3Department of Internal Medicine, Dell School of Medicine, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA Background Interstitial Lung Diseases (ILD) are a heterogeneous group of disorders primarily involving the lung interstitium, characterized by inflammation and/or fibrosis. This category includes over 200 distinct diseases, with etiologies ranging from known to idiopathic [1]. ILD significantly contributes to global morbidity and mortality. According to the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) 2019 study, from 1990 to 2019, incidence, mortality, and disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) associated with ILD increased by 118.6%, 166.63%, and 122.87%, respectively [2]. © The Author(s) 2026. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by

FAQs

What is the main objective of this US population study?

To quantify and characterize cancer-related mortality among decedents with ILD across the United States.

Which data source and time period were used for the analysis?

The CDC multiple cause-of-death database was used, analyzing ILD-cancer related age-adjusted mortality rates from 1999 to 2019.

How did cancer-related mortality trends change in ILD decedents?

From 1999 to 2019, ILD-cancer related age-adjusted mortality rates increased by 8.2%, rising from 11.415 to 12.347 per 1,000,000.

Sep 22, 2026

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