epidemiology of gastric cancer in northwest iran: 2003-2011

background: gastric cancer is the fifth most common cancer in the world and the third leading cause of death from cancer worldwide. this study aims to assess the epidemiology of gastric cancer in ardabil province, iran. methods: this was a descriptive cross-sectional study performed on 1056 patients with gastric cancer registered in the ardabil cancer registry. data were collected by a checklist and analyzed by statistical methods in spss version 19. results: out of 1056 cases, 37% were smokers and 80.9% were illiterate. there were 73.1% male cases. adenocarcinoma was the most common (89.5%) type of cancer and prevalent in males. the tumors were mostly located in the gastric cardia. most cases were from rural areas. conclusion : results showed that the incidence of gastric cancer in ardabil province was higher in males compared to females. compared to the country standards the incidence of gastric cancer was higher.