(HealthDay News) — Indoor tanning, even without burns, increases the risk of melanoma, according to a study published online May 28 in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.
Rachel Isaksson Vogel, of the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, and colleagues used data from a case-control study involving 1,167 patients who had been diagnosed with invasive cutaneous melanoma between 2004 and 2007 and 1,101 control subjects who were matched by age and sex.
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The researchers sought to assess the risk of melanoma associated with indoor tanning. The researchers adjusted for eye, hair, and skin color; number of freckles and moles; family history of melanoma; and lifetime sun exposure and sunscreen use.
The researchers found that, overall, 56.8% of all patients reported five or more lifetime sunburns, and 5.3% reported never having been sunburned.
Patients with melanoma reporting zero lifetime sunburns were nearly four times more likely to be indoor tanners compared with control subjects (odds ratio, 3.87; P = 0.002). Patients with melanoma also tended to initiate indoor tanning at a younger age and reported the highest number of years and sessions of indoor tanning, compared with other patients who had experienced sunburn.
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“Tanning indoors without burning may allow for greater cumulative exposure to the damaging effects of artificial and/or solar UV [ultraviolet] radiation,” the researchers wrote. “The intensity and proportion of UV-A and UV-B emitted by tanning devices have been shown to differ from the sun in ways that could increase risks associated with indoor tanning.”
