Tattoos can be connected with an elevated risk for malignant lymphoma, a cancer involving the lymphatic system in the blood, according to a new study.
Carrying a tattoo was found by investigators in a study published last May in the journal e Clinical Medicine to have had an associated 21% risk increase of getting a lymphoma diagnosis.
The past few years have also witnessed an increase in tattoo popularity, with 23% of respondents in the United States reporting to have one in 2010 compared to 32% in 2023. With these statistics, the interest of experts in learning more about their effects on the body has increased.
The authors concluded that tattoos might be a risk factor for malignant lymphoma and that this can be approached from a public health point of view.
The study never said that tattoos cause lymphoma, but it just discovered an association. A few experts who were not involved with the study cautioned against overreading the results.
What you should know about the potential relationship between tattoos and cancer is discussed below.
Exploring the Research More Closely
Studies to date have shown a relatively weak connection between tattoos and cancer.
For example, several tattoo ink constituents have been classified by the International Agency for Research on Cancer as carcinogenic or possibly carcinogenic, although mainly when ingested, inhaled, or applied on the skin surface.
Further, it has been found that tattoo pigment is filtered by and stored in the lymph nodes, where some types of lymphoma begin.4.
Considering this, Nielsen and her colleagues sought to learn more about the long-term effects of tattoo ink.
They matched all the cases of malignant lymphoma diagnosed in approximately 12,000 people aged between 20 and 60 during 2007 and 2017 with data from the Swedish National Cancer Register, which is a national health database. They then compared those results with responses to a survey they sent out in 2021 asking participants whether they had tattoos and, if so, how many and what percentage of their bodies they covered in ink.
About 20% of participants had tattoos in general. It was discovered by the scientists that having a tattoo was related to a general risk increase of about 21% for developing lymphoma, and that the size of the tattoo did not affect an individual’s risk.
Those who got inked less than two years before diagnosis had the most cases of lymphoma. That risk declined until about 11 years after either the tattoo or the diagnosis, at which time it reversed.
Lymphoma does impact the area of body part which helps in preventing pathogens by the immune system. There are two broad types of lymphoma including Hodgkin lymphoma; that is even less common and other non-Hodgkin that makes up around 4% cases of cancer diagnosed in the U.S.
According to Christel Nielsen, PhD, lead author of the study and associate professor in the occupational and environmental medicine division at Lund University in Sweden, it is very important to remember that lymphoma is an extremely rare disease. “The increase is related to a very low baseline risk.”
What Do Physicians Say?
According to professionals surveyed, there is no need to freak out whether you already have a tattoo or are thinking about getting one.
It is true that certain environmental factors increase the risk of developing cancer. A compromised immune system and exposure to toxins like benzene and some herbicides are recognized risk factors for lymphoma.
But you need a lot of evidence to prove that a certain environmental exposure causes cancerous cells, Marc Hoffmann, MD, director of the lymphoma program in the University of Kansas Cancer Center’s division of hematologic malignancies and cellular therapeutics, told Health.
For example, he said that the link between smoking and nuclear radiation exposure and cancer “are dramatic and undeniable.” But, he added, tattoos have not been shown to have that clear-cut relationship.
Actually, two earlier studies that investigated the potential association between tattoos and lymphoma found none.
Hematologist-oncologist Catherine Diefenbach, MD, of NYU Langone in New York, said she even questions the results of the latest study.
She said that the finding, which shows a risk of lymphoma two years after getting a tattoo and then again after 11 years, does not add up.
“The other thing that doesn’t make sense is if this is a toxin that gets put into the body through ink, there isn’t an association between the size of the tattoo and cancer risk,” she said. The “study does raise questions, but the majority of patients with tattoos don’t develop lymphoma.”
