12.5: Types of Cancer

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There are more than 100 types of cancer. Types of cancer are usually named for the organs or tissues where the cancers form. For example, lung cancer starts in cells of the lung, and brain cancer starts in cells of the brain. Cancers also may be described by the type of cell that formed them, such as an epithelial cell or a squamous cell.

Common Cancer Types

This list of common cancer types includes cancers that are diagnosed with the greatest frequency in the United States, excluding non-melanoma skin cancers:

Cancer incidence and mortality statistics reported by the American Cancer Society and other resources were used to create the list. To qualify as a common cancer for the list, the estimated annual incidence for 2016 had to be 40,000 cases or more.

The most common type of cancer on the list is breast cancer, with more than 284,200 new cases expected in the United States in 2021. The next most common cancers are lung cancer and prostate cancer.

Because colon and rectal cancers are often referred to as “colorectal cancers,” these two cancer types are combined for the list. For 2021, the estimated number of new cases of colon cancer and rectal cancer are 104,270 and 45,230, respectively, adding to a total of 149,500 new cases of colorectal cancer.

The following table gives the estimated numbers of new cases and deaths for each common cancer type:

Cancer Type	Estimated New Cases	Estimated Deaths
Bladder	83,730	17,200
Breast (Female – Male)	281,550 – 2,650	43,600 – 530
Colon and Rectal (Combined)	149,500	52,980
Endometrial	66,570	12,940
Kidney (Renal Cell and Renal Pelvis) Cancer	76,080	13,780
Leukemia (All Types)	61,090	23,660
Lung (Including Bronchus)	235,760	131,880
Melanoma	106,110	7,180
Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma	81,560	20,720
Pancreatic	60,430	48,220
Prostate	248,530	34,130
Thyroid	44,280	2,200

Contributors and Attributions

Public Domain Content

Common Cancer Types. Authored by: National Cancer Institute. Provided by: National Institutes of Health. Located at: https://www.cancer.gov/types/common-cancers. License: Public Domain: No Known Copyright