| 1. |
- Backman, Helena, 1979-
(författare)
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Lung function and prevalence trends in asthma and COPD
- 2016
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Background: Asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are common obstructive airway diseases with a substantial burden in terms of morbidity, mortality and costs. Smoking is the single most important risk factor for COPD, and is associated with incident asthma. It is important to know if the prevalence of asthma and COPD is increasing or decreasing in the population in order to effectively allocate health care resources. The definitions of these diseases have varied over time which makes it difficult to measure changes in prevalence. The preferred method is to estimate the prevalence with the same procedures and definitions based on cross-sectional population samples with identical age distributions in the same geographical area at different time points. Measurements of lung function (spirometry) are required to diagnose COPD, and spirometry is used to evaluate disease severity and progress of both asthma and COPD, where observed values are compared to reference values. The most commonly used reference values in Sweden are published during the mid 1980s, and there are few evaluations of how appropriate they are today based on Swedish population samples. The aim of the thesis was to estimate trends in the prevalence of asthma and COPD in relation to smoking habits, and to evaluate and estimate reference values for spirometry.Methods: The project was based on population-based samples of adults from the Obstructive Lung Disease in Northern Sweden (OLIN) studies. Postal questionnaires were sent to large cohorts, recruited in 1992 (n=4851, 20-69 years), 1996 (n=7420, 20-74 years) and 2006 (n=6165, 20-69 years), respectively. The questionnaire included questions on respiratory symptoms and diseases, their comorbidities and several possible risk factors including smoking habits. Structured interviews and spirometry were performed in random samples of the responders to the 1992 and 2006 surveys, of which n=660 (in 1994) and n=623 (in 2009) were within identical age-spans (23-72 years). The trend in asthma prevalence was estimated by comparing the postal questionnaire surveys in 1996 and 2006, and the trend in COPD prevalence was estimated by comparing the samples participating in dynamic spirometry in 1994 and 2009, respectively. The prevalence of COPD was estimated based on two different definitions of COPD. Commonly used reference values for spirometry were evaluated based on randomly sampled healthy non-smokers defined in clinical examinations of participants in the 2006 postal questionnaire (n=501). The main focus of the evaluation was the global lung function initiative (GLI) reference values published in 2012, for which Z-scores and percent of predicted values were analysed. New sex-specific reference values for spirometry were estimated by linear regression, with age and height as predictors. These new OLIN reference values were also evaluated on a sample of healthy non-smokers identified in the population-based West Sweden Asthma Study.Results: Although the prevalence of smoking decreased from 27.4% to 19.1%, p<0.001, between 1996 and 2006, the prevalence of physician-diagnosed asthma increased from 9.4% to 11.6%, p<0.001. The prevalence of symptoms common in asthma such as recurrent wheeze did not change significantly between the surveys or tended to decrease, while bronchitis symptoms such as cough and sputum production decreased significantly. The evaluation of the GLI reference values showed that the predicted values were significantly lower compared to the observed values in Norrbotten, which makes the percent of predicted too high. This was especially true for FVC percent predicted with a mean of 106%. In general, the deviations were more pronounced among women. New OLIN reference values valid for the Norrbotten sample were modelled and showed a high external validity when applied on the sample from western Sweden. The prevalence of moderate to severe COPD decreased substantially over the 15-year period between 1994 and 2009, regardless of definition.Conclusions: In parallel with substantially decreased smoking habits in the population between 1996 and 2006, the prevalence of several airway symptoms decreased while the prevalence of physician-diagnosed asthma increased. These results suggest increased diagnostic activity for asthma, but may also suggest that the asthma prevalence has continued to increase. In contrast to asthma, the prevalence of COPD tended to decrease and moderate to severe COPD decreased substantially. The continuous decrease in smoking in Sweden during several decades prior to the study period is most likely contributing to these results. The evaluation of reference values showed that the GLI reference values were lower than the observed spirometric values in the population, especially for women, why the new up-to date reference values may be of importance for disease evaluation in epidemiology and in the health care as well.
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| 2. |
- Larose, Tricia L., et al.
(författare)
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Circulating cotinine concentrations and lung cancer risk in the Lung Cancer Cohort Consortium (LC3)
- 2018
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Ingår i: International Journal of Epidemiology. - : Oxford University Press. - 0300-5771 .- 1464-3685. ; 47:6, s. 1760-1771
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Self-reported smoking is the principal measure used to assess lung cancer risk in epidemiological studies. We evaluated if circulating cotinine—a nicotine metabolite and biomarker of recent tobacco exposure—provides additional information on lung cancer risk.Methods: The study was conducted in the Lung Cancer Cohort Consortium (LC3) involving 20 prospective cohort studies. Pre-diagnostic serum cotinine concentrations were measured in one laboratory on 5364 lung cancer cases and 5364 individually matched controls. We used conditional logistic regression to evaluate the association between circulating cotinine and lung cancer, and assessed if cotinine provided additional risk-discriminative information compared with self-reported smoking (smoking status, smoking intensity, smoking duration), using receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis.Results: We observed a strong positive association between cotinine and lung cancer risk for current smokers [odds ratio (OR ) per 500 nmol/L increase in cotinine (OR500): 1.39, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.32–1.47]. Cotinine concentrations consistent with active smoking (≥115 nmol/L) were common in former smokers (cases: 14.6%; controls: 9.2%) and rare in never smokers (cases: 2.7%; controls: 0.8%). Former and never smokers with cotinine concentrations indicative of active smoking (≥115 nmol/L) also showed increased lung cancer risk. For current smokers, the risk-discriminative performance of cotinine combined with self-reported smoking (AUCintegrated: 0.69, 95% CI: 0.68–0.71) yielded a small improvement over self-reported smoking alone (AUCsmoke: 0.66, 95% CI: 0.64–0.68) (P = 1.5x10–9).Conclusions: Circulating cotinine concentrations are consistently associated with lung cancer risk for current smokers and provide additional risk-discriminative information compared with self-report smoking alone.
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| 3. |
- Fanidi, Anouar, et al.
(författare)
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Circulating Folate, Vitamin B6, and Methionine in Relation to Lung Cancer Risk in the Lung Cancer Cohort Consortium (LC3)
- 2018
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Ingår i: Journal of the National Cancer Institute. - : Oxford University Press. - 0027-8874 .- 1460-2105. ; 110:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Circulating concentrations of B vitamins and factors related to one-carbon metabolism have been found to be strongly inversely associated with lung cancer risk in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) study. The extent to which these associations are present in other study populations is unknown.Methods: Within 20 prospective cohorts from the National Cancer Institute Cohort Consortium, a nested case-control study was designed including 5364 incident lung cancer case patients and 5364 control subjects who were individually matched to case patients by age, sex, cohort, and smoking status. Centralized biochemical analyses were performed to measure circulating concentrations of vitamin B6, folate, and methionine, as well as cotinine as an indicator of recent tobacco exposure. The association between these biomarkers and lung cancer risk was evaluated using conditional logistic regression models.Results: Participants with higher circulating concentrations of vitamin B6 and folate had a modestly decreased risk of lung cancer risk overall, the odds ratios when comparing the top and bottom fourths (OR 4vs1 ) being 0.88 (95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.78 to 1.00) and 0.86 (95% CI = 0.74 to 0.99), respectively. We found stronger associations among men (vitamin B6: OR 4vs1 = 0.74, 95% CI = 0.62 to 0.89; folate: OR 4vs1 = 0.75, 95% CI = 0.61 to 0.93) and ever smokers (vitamin B6: OR 4vs1 = 0.78, 95% CI = 0.67 to 0.91; folate: OR 4vs1 = 0.87, 95% CI = 0.73 to 1.03). We further noted that the association of folate was restricted to Europe/Australia and Asia, whereas no clear association was observed for the United States. Circulating concentrations of methionine were not associated with lung cancer risk overall or in important subgroups.Conclusions: Although confounding by tobacco exposure or reverse causation cannot be ruled out, these study results are compatible with a small decrease in lung cancer risk in ever smokers who avoid low concentrations of circulating folate and vitamin B6.
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| 4. |
- Fanidi, Anouar, et al.
(författare)
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Is high vitamin B12 status a cause of lung cancer?
- 2019
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Ingår i: International Journal of Cancer. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 0020-7136 .- 1097-0215. ; 145:6, s. 1499-1503
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Vitamin B supplementation can have side effects for human health, including cancer risk. We aimed to elucidate the role of vitamin B12 in lung cancer etiology via direct measurements of pre‐diagnostic circulating vitamin B12 concentrations in a nested case–control study, complemented with a Mendelian randomization (MR) approach in an independent case–control sample. We used pre‐diagnostic biomarker data from 5183 case–control pairs nested within 20 prospective cohorts, and genetic data from 29,266 cases and 56,450 controls. Exposures included directly measured circulating vitamin B12 in pre‐diagnostic blood samples from the nested case–control study, and 8 single nucleotide polymorphisms associated with vitamin B12 concentrations in the MR study. Our main outcome of interest was increased risk for lung cancer, overall and by histological subtype, per increase in circulating vitamin B12 concentrations. We found circulating vitamin B12 to be positively associated with overall lung cancer risk in a dose response fashion (odds ratio for a doubling in B12 [ORlog2B12] = 1.15, 95% confidence interval (95%CI) = 1.06–1.25). The MR analysis based on 8 genetic variants also indicated that genetically determined higher vitamin B12 concentrations were positively associated with overall lung cancer risk (OR per 150 pmol/L standard deviation increase in B12 [ORSD] = 1.08, 95%CI = 1.00–1.16). Considering the consistency of these two independent and complementary analyses, these findings support the hypothesis that high vitamin B12 status increases the risk of lung cancer.
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| 5. |
- Lassmann-Klee, Paul, et al.
(författare)
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Differences of FENO in adult general populations of Nordic regions
- 2019
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Ingår i: European Respiratory Journal. - : European Respiratory Society. - 0903-1936 .- 1399-3003. ; 54:Suppl. 63
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Tidskriftsartikel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Background: Eventual differences of expiratory nitric oxide (FENO) levels in general populations of Nordic countries may reflect differences in eosinophilic inflammation at population level.Aim: To study the differences in FENO of Nordic regions and their epidemiological associations.Methods: From 1997 to 2003 we measured FENO (ppb) and conducted skin prick-tests for a random sample of adults (n=1498), aged 20-60 years from Finland (Helsinki), Sweden (Stockholm and Örebro) and Estonia (Narva and Saaremaa). We compared differences between regions by estimating odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for high FENO (>25 ppb) using logistic regression adjusted for gender, smoking and allergy. Finally, we estimated crude ORs and 95% CIs for high FENO and for asthma, rhinitis, current asthma symptoms and asthma medication.Results: The mean and standard deviation (SD) for FENO was 19(14) in Finland, 18(12) in Sweden and 16(15) in Estonia (p<0.001). Estonia had a lower mean FENO than other countries, with no differences between Finland and Sweden. Compared to Helsinki, the adjusted OR (95%CI) for high FENO was 0.42(0.21-0.81) in Stockholm, 0.65(0.43-0.98) in Örebro, 0.53(0.32-0.84) in Narva and 0.45(0.28-0.71) in Saaremaa. In Estonia, high FENO was associated with asthma, allergy, rhinitis, current asthma, and asthma medication; in Finland with rhinitis and use of short acting β-agonist; in Sweden with asthma and asthma medication. Smoking was associated with low FENO. Mean FENO in asthmatics was 24(19) in Finland, 20(12) in Sweden, and 43(49) in Estonia (p=0.07).Conclusions: We observed a higher mean FENO in Finland and Sweden compared to Estonia, and found no overall differences of FENO levels in asthmatics.
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| 6. |
- Midttun, Oivind, et al.
(författare)
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Circulating concentrations of biomarkers and metabolites related to vitamin status, one-carbon and the kynurenine pathways in US, Nordic, Asian, and Australian populations
- 2017
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Ingår i: American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. - : AMER SOC NUTRITION-ASN. - 0002-9165 .- 1938-3207. ; 105:6, s. 1314-1326
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Circulating concentrations of biomarkers that are related to vitamin status vary by factors such as diet, fortification, and supplement use. Published biomarker concentrations have also been influenced by the variation across laboratories, which complicates a comparison of results from different studies. Objective: We robustly and comprehensively assessed differences in biomarkers that are related to vitamin status across geographic regions. Design: The trial was a cross-sectional study in which we investigated 38 biomarkers that are related to vitamin status and one-carbon and tryptophan metabolism in serum and plasma from 5314 healthy control subjects representing 20 cohorts recruited from the United States, Nordic countries, Asia, and Australia, participating in the Lung Cancer Cohort Consortium. All samples were analyzed in a centralized laboratory. Results: Circulating concentrations of riboflavin, pyridoxal 5'-phosphate, folate, vitamin B-12, all-trans retinol, 25-hydroxyvitamin D, and a-tocopherol as well as combined vitamin scores that were based on these nutrients showed that the general B-vitamin concentration was highest in the United States and that the B vitamins and lipid soluble vitamins were low in Asians. Conversely, circulating concentrations of metabolites that are inversely related to B vitamins involved in the one-carbon and kynurenine pathways were high in Asians. The high B-vitamin concentration in the United States appears to be driven mainly by multivitamin-supplement users. Conclusions: The observed differences likely reflect the variation in intake of vitamins and, in particular, the widespread multivitamin-supplement use in the United States. The results provide valuable information about the differences in biomarker concentrations in populations across continents.
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| 7. |
- Muller, David C., et al.
(författare)
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Circulating high sensitivity C reactive protein concentrations and risk of lung cancer : nested case-control study within Lung Cancer Cohort Consortium
- 2019
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Ingår i: The BMJ. - : BMJ Publishing Group Ltd. - 1756-1833 .- 0959-8138. ; 364
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Objectives To conduct a comprehensive analysis of prospectively measured circulating high sensitivity C reactive protein (hsCRP) concentration and risk of lung cancer overall, by smoking status (never, former, and current smokers), and histological sub-type.Design Nested case-control study.Setting 20 population based cohort studies in Asia, Europe, Australia, and the United States.Participants 5299 patients with incident lung cancer, with individually incidence density matched controls.Exposure Circulating hsCRP concentrations in prediagnostic serum or plasma samples.Main outcome measure Incident lung cancer diagnosis.Results A positive association between circulating hsCRP concentration and the risk of lung cancer for current (odds ratio associated with a doubling in hsCRP concentration 1.09, 95% confidence interval 1.05 to 1.13) and former smokers (1.09, 1.04 to 1.14) was observed, but not for never smokers (P<0.01 for interaction). This association was strong and consistent across all histological subtypes, except for adenocarcinoma, which was not strongly associated with hsCRP concentration regardless of smoking status (odds ratio for adenocarcinoma overall 0.97, 95% confidence interval 0.94 to 1.01). The association between circulating hsCRP concentration and the risk of lung cancer was strongest in the first two years of follow-up for former and current smokers. Including hsCRP concentration in a risk model, in addition to smoking based variables, did not improve risk discrimination overall, but slightly improved discrimination for cancers diagnosed in the first two years of follow-up.Conclusions Former and current smokers with higher circulating hsCRP concentrations had a higher risk of lung cancer overall. Circulating hsCRP concentration was not associated with the risk of lung adenocarcinoma. Circulating hsCRP concentration could be a prediagnostic marker of lung cancer rather than a causal risk factor.
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| 8. |
- Spjuth, Ola, 1977-, et al.
(författare)
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Harmonising and linking biomedical and clinical data across disparate data archives to enable integrative cross-biobank research
- 2016
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Ingår i: European Journal of Human Genetics. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1018-4813 .- 1476-5438. ; 24:4, s. 521-528
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- A wealth of biospecimen samples are stored in modern globally distributed biobanks. Biomedical researchers worldwide need to be able to combine the available resources to improve the power of large-scale studies. A prerequisite for this effort is to be able to search and access phenotypic, clinical and other information about samples that are currently stored at biobanks in an integrated manner. However, privacy issues together with heterogeneous information systems and the lack of agreed-upon vocabularies have made specimen searching across multiple biobanks extremely challenging. We describe three case studies where we have linked samples and sample descriptions in order to facilitate global searching of available samples for research. The use cases include the ENGAGE (European Network for Genetic and Genomic Epidemiology) consortium comprising at least 39 cohorts, the SUMMIT (surrogate markers for micro- and macro-vascular hard endpoints for innovative diabetes tools) consortium and a pilot for data integration between a Swedish clinical health registry and a biobank. We used the Sample avAILability (SAIL) method for data linking: first, created harmonised variables and then annotated and made searchable information on the number of specimens available in individual biobanks for various phenotypic categories. By operating on this categorised availability data we sidestep many obstacles related to privacy that arise when handling real values and show that harmonised and annotated records about data availability across disparate biomedical archives provide a key methodological advance in pre-analysis exchange of information between biobanks, that is, during the project planning phase.
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| 9. |
- Theofylaktopoulou, Despoina, et al.
(författare)
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Impaired functional vitamin B6 status is associated with increased risk of lung cancer
- 2018
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Ingår i: International Journal of Cancer. - : Wiley. - 0020-7136 .- 1097-0215. ; 142:12, s. 2425-2434
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Circulating vitamin B6 levels have been found to be inversely associated with lung cancer. Most studies have focused on the B6 form pyridoxal 5'-phosphate (PLP), a direct biomarker influenced by inflammation and other factors. Using a functional B6 marker allows further investigation of the potential role of vitamin B6 status in the pathogenesis of lung cancer. We prospectively evaluated the association of the functional marker of vitamin B6 status, the 3-hydroxykynurenine:xanthurenic acid (HK:XA) ratio, with risk of lung cancer in a nested case-control study consisting of 5,364 matched case-control pairs from the Lung Cancer Cohort Consortium (LC3). We used conditional logistic regression to evaluate the association between HK:XA and lung cancer, and random effect models to combine results from different cohorts and regions. High levels of HK:XA, indicating impaired functional B6 status, were associated with an increased risk of lung cancer, the odds ratio comparing the fourth and the first quartiles (OR4th vs. 1st) was 1.25 (95% confidence interval, 1.10-1.41). Stratified analyses indicated that this association was primarily driven by cases diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma. Notably, the risk associated with HK:XA was approximately 50% higher in groups with a high relative frequency of squamous cell carcinoma, i.e., men, former and current smokers. This risk of squamous cell carcinoma was present in both men and women regardless of smoking status.
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| 10. |
- van Duijnhoven, Fraenzel J. B., et al.
(författare)
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Circulating concentrations of vitamin D in relation to pancreatic cancer risk in European populations
- 2018
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Ingår i: International Journal of Cancer. - : WILEY. - 0020-7136 .- 1097-0215. ; 142:6, s. 1189-1201
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Evidence from in vivo, in vitro and ecological studies are suggestive of a protective effect of vitamin D against pancreatic cancer (PC). However, this has not been confirmed by analytical epidemiological studies. We aimed to examine the association between pre-diagnostic circulating vitamin D concentrations and PC incidence in European populations. We conducted a pooled nested case-control study within the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) and the Nord-TrOndelag Health Study's second survey (HUNT2) cohorts. In total, 738 primary incident PC cases (EPIC n=626; HUNT2 n=112; median follow-up=6.9 years) were matched to 738 controls. Vitamin D [25(OH)D-2 and 25(OH)D-3 combined] concentrations were determined using isotope-dilution liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry. Conditional logistic regression models with adjustments for body mass index and smoking habits were used to estimate incidence rate ratios (IRRs) and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI). Compared with a reference category of >50 to 75 nmol/L vitamin D, the IRRs (95% CIs) were 0.71 (0.42-1.20); 0.94 (0.72-1.22); 1.12 (0.82-1.53) and 1.26 (0.79-2.01) for clinically pre-defined categories of 25; >25 to 50; >75 to 100; and >100 nmol/L vitamin D, respectively (p for trend=0.09). Corresponding analyses by quintiles of season-standardized vitamin D concentrations also did not reveal associations with PC risk (p for trend=0.23). Although these findings among participants from the largest combination of European cohort studies to date show increasing effect estimates of PC risk with increasing pre-diagnostic concentrations of vitamin D, they are not statistically significant.
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