Relative risk gives you a comparison or ratio rather than an absolute value. But her risk of developing colon and rectal cancer before the age of 50 is 0.4 percent, or about 4 out of every 1,000 women. For instance, an American woman's lifetime risk of developing colon and rectal cancer is about 4 percent, or about 40 out of every 1,000 women. An individual's cancer risk has a lot to do with other factors, such as age. Lifetime risk isn't the risk that a person will develop cancer in the next year or the next five years. This also means that 88 out of every 100 men won't develop prostate cancer. Put another way, about 12 out of every 100 men will develop prostate cancer at some time in their lives.
For instance, an American man's absolute risk of developing prostate cancer in his lifetime is about 12 percent. One type of absolute risk is lifetime risk, which is the probability that an individual will develop cancer during the course of a lifetime.
