Survival of 12,051 cancer patients was investigated in incident cases registered in an ad hoc survey in the Umbria region for the period 1978-82. Death certificate only cases were excluded. The follow-up was carried out by an automatic link with the RENCAM (nominative register of causes of death) and verified at the Registrar's Offices of the various towns of the region. Both observed and relative survival rates according to sex and selected time periods (1, 5 and 10 years) were calculated. Generally, the relative survival rate for all tumour sites at 5 years was 0.35 in males and 0.53 in females (P < 0.01), and 0.31 and 0.49, respectively, at 10 years. 5-year relative survival rates greater than 0.50 were found for only three tumour sites in men (bladder, larynx, colon), accounting for approximately 21% of all men included in the study, but for six sites in females (breast, uterus, kidney, bladder, rectum, colon), accounting for more than 50% of the female cases. The 5-year age-adjusted relative survival rates in Umbria were higher than in other Italian and European registries for selected sites (stomach, colon, rectum, lung). High survival in Umbria could probably be related to the availability of specialist care and to the easy access to a network of oncological services.