area) or pelvis. When the cancer is in the penis itself (local) and involves no more than a few nearby inguinal lymph nodes , it can be cured, but cure rates fall rapidly once it spreads to the pelvic lymph nodes.
What Causes It This is one of the few cancers where the cause is fairly well known. Men who are circumcised at birth (a common practice among whites in the United States) almost never get cancer of the penis. If circumcision is performed at puberty, the incidence of cancer is slightly higher, and men who are circumcised as adults are not protected and experience the same incidence of penile cancer as men who are never circumcised at all.
Cancer of the penis is, in a sense, a disease of poor hygiene. It is believed that the decaying cells of the undersurface of the foreskin (smegma) produce irritation leading to cancer. In addition, there may be a relationship between venereal warts (condyloma acuminata) and penile cancer. Recent studies have demonstrated an association between certain types of the virus that causes condylomata (human papilloma virus types 16 and 18) and penile cancer in about one man in three who have penile cancer. These human papilloma virus (HPV) types are also found in women who have cancer in the uterine cervix . It has also been shown that cancer of the uterine cervix may be higher in the sexual partners of men who are not circumcised. This is of special importance to female sexual partners of uncircumcised men and of men with HPV infections because the women often develop cancer of the cervix when exposed to the viruses that produce female warts, even if the men do not have a cancerous change in their warts.
