Melanoma of the skin in the national cause-of-death statistics and in the hospital statistics

In the last 40 years the national mortality from melanoma of the skin, corrected for age, has increased by over 300%. Figures for males are always higher than those for females and this difference tends to grow larger. Since 1960 it has mostly been the mortality in the age groups 30-69 years that increased. The rise in mortality of older persons has been relatively small. Among the patients treated clinically, females are in the majority and increasingly so from year to year. Probability of survival is better for females than for males. Major shifts seem to occur in the localization of the lesion. Lesions are localized relatively less often in the skin of the head. In males, it is the frequency of melanomas of the trunk that is rising, while melanomas of the extremities are markedly increasing in frequency in both males and females.