Cancer Patterns and Their Age- and Sex-Specific Distribution among Patients in a Tertiary Care Hospital: A Cross-Sectional Study

Background: Cancer is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, and its burden in India continues to rise alongside the ongoing epidemiological transition. Patterns of cancer occurrence vary considerably by age, sex, and geographic region, and hospital-based data from tertiary care centres provide valuable local insight where population-based registries are unavailable. Objectives: To describe the pattern of cancers and analyse their distribution by age and sex among patients registered in the Radiotherapy Department of a tertiary care hospital in central India. Methods: A hospital-record-based cross-sectional study was conducted among patients with confirmed malignancy registered in the Department of Radiotherapy, Government Bundelkhand Medical College, Sagar, Madhya Pradesh. Demographic details and cancer site were abstracted from departmental registers using a pretested structured proforma and analysed descriptively. Results: Of 506 patients, 274 (54.15%) were male and 232 (45.85%) were female (male-to-female ratio ≈1.18:1). Nearly half (46.25%) were aged 40–59 years, followed by 34.19% aged 60–79 years; only 1.58% were below 20 years. Breast cancer was the single most common malignancy (96 cases, 19.0%), followed by cancers of the tongue (49, 9.7%) and lung (28, 5.5%). Breast and ovarian cancers occurred exclusively among females and prostate cancer only among males, while tongue, lung, haematologic, buccal mucosa, rectal, and oropharyngeal cancers — and head and neck cancers overall — were more frequent among males. Conclusion: This hospital-based study demonstrates a substantial cancer burden concentrated in the middle-to-older age groups, with sex-specific patterns consistent with the influence of tobacco use and reproductive/hormonal factors. These findings can help guide age- and sex-targeted screening, early-detection, and tobacco-control strategies in this part of central India.