Asthma and allergy in adolescence and risk of prostate cancer

• Introduction: The role of inflammation in prostate cancer has been widely discussed [1]. Exploring the association between immunological or inflammatory conditions, that reflect immune response profile, and prostate cancer risk may provide clues to the type of inflammatory processes involved in the etiology of prostate cancer. Asthma and allergic conditions have been suggested to reduce the risk of prostate cancer, but data from large studies are currently scarce and results are conflicting [2,3].Objectives: To test if asthma, hay fever, or any allergic condition present in adolescence is associated with a decreased risk of prostate cancer later in life.Methods: This study is based on a cohort of 243,309 men born in Sweden between 1952 and 1956 who underwent mandatory conscription assessments for military service around ages 18-19 years. At this time, a thorough assessment of the men’s health was performed, and conditions such as asthma, hay fever, and allergies were recorded. The cohort was followed for incident prostate cancer through linkage with the Swedish cancer- and population registers. Cox regression was used to estimate adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for the association between the selected conditions and prostate cancer incidence.Results: A total of 1,654 men were diagnosed with prostate cancer during a maximum of 40.3 years of follow-up (median 36.7 years). At the time of conscription assessment, there were 11,754 men with hay fever, 4,943 with an asthma-diagnosis and 16,112 with any allergic condition. We observed no difference in prostate cancer risk for men with asthma (HR: 0.91, 95% CI: 0.63-1.3), hay fever (HR: 1.03, 95% CI: 0.82-1.28) or any allergic condition (HR: 0.98, 95% CI: 0.8-1.19) compared with men without these diagnoses. Small numbers precluded separate analyses of men with advanced or lethal prostate cancer (n¼6 andn¼3, respectively).Conclusion: Our results do not support the hypothesis that presence of asthma or allergic conditions in late adolescence reduces the risk of prostate cancer later in life. If inflammatory processes are involved in the pathogenesis of prostate cancer, the immune response profiles likely differ from those reflected in clinical diagnoses of asthma or allergic conditions. The possibility that different risk patterns may be observed among older men with advanced or lethal prostate cancer, however, cannot be excluded.

Ämnesord

MEDICIN OCH HÄLSOVETENSKAP  -- Klinisk medicin -- Urologi och njurmedicin (hsv//swe)

MEDICAL AND HEALTH SCIENCES  -- Clinical Medicine -- Urology and Nephrology (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Epidemiology & natural history

prostate & genitalia

tumors

trauma & transplantation

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vet (ämneskategori)

art (ämneskategori)