Prenatal histories, including drug use, were obtained for the mothers of 48 young females and males reported to the New York State Cancer Registry with tumors of the breast and urogenital organs (excluding vaginal adenocarcinornas previously reported in the literature). Stilbestrol was taken during pregnancy by the mother of only one patient, an 18-year-old girl, with an adenocarcinoma involving both the cervix and vagina. Time trends in incidence for the 0 to 24 year age group, born at a time when stilbestrol might have been used in pregnancy, were compared to the unexposed 25 to 34 year age group. There were no increases that could be attributed to stilbestrol use. There is thus far no indication that maternal use of stilbestrol contributes to the development of tumors other than those of the lower female genital tract. RENATAL I N D U C T I O N OF VAGINAL CANCER P through the maternal ingestion of stilbestrol and other synthetic estrogens has been confirmed in two recent reports.l.2 Adenocarcinomas of the vagina were detected in young women, less than 25 years of age, whose mothers received these hormones during gestation.
T h e possibility that tumors originating outside the lower female genital tract may also be associated with maternal stilbestrol use seems pIausible in view of the original studies. In support of this possibility, Linden and Henderson4 recently drew attention to an apparent increase of uterine corpus, prostatic, testicular and male bladder cancer among young people from 1950-62 to 1963-69. T h e present report outlines our initial attempt to determine if cancers of sites other than vagina are associated with intrauterine exposure to synthetic estrogens.