Prostate cancer incidence

Stram DO, Hankin JH, Wilkens LR, Park S, Henderson BE, Nomura AM, Pike MC and Kolonel LN. 2006. Prostate cancer incidence and intake of fruits, vegetables and related micronutrients the multiethnic cohort study (United States). Cancer Causes Control 17(9) 1193—1207. 

Prostate cancer incidence and mortality vary in different countries and racial groups, and this implicates not only genetic or hereditary differences but also environmental and dietary factors. American Blacks have the highest incidence and mortality, followed by Whites and lastly Asians. Black and Asian Americans... 

Supporting evidence for an antiprostate cancer effect of selenium was obtained for a nested case-control design within the Health Professional Follow-up study (Yoshizawa et al. 1998), which found that higher prediagnostic selenium levels were associated with reduced prostate cancer incidence. This study included 33,737 male health professionals aged 40-75 years who provided toenail clippings in 1987. 

Quinn, M. and P. Babb (2002a). Patterns and trends in prostate cancer incidence, survival, prevalence and mortality. Part I international comparisons. BJU Int 90(2) 162-173. 

Snpplementation with a-tocopherol for 6 years decreased prostate cancer incidence in smokers by 34%. ... 

Supplementation of Finnish smokers with 50mg/d of synthetic a-tocopherol for 6 years was associated with a 34% decrease in prostate cancer incidence, and p-carotene (50mg on alternate days) supplementation of male physicians with low baseline seram p-carotene concentrations for 12 years was associated with a 32% decrease in prostate cancer incidence. These data may indicate that men with low intake or increased destruction of these compounds, e.g., through oxidative stress, represent subgroups that could benefit from supplementation. 

Wei MY, Giovannucci EL (2012) Lycopene, tomato products, and prostate cancer incidence a review and reassessment in the PSA screening era. J Oncol 2012 271063... 

The incidence of prostate cancer also appears to have risen in many countries. "... 

Prostate Cancer. Evidence that phytoestrogens can influence the incidence of male-speciflc diseases is restricted to prostate cancer, and is largely of an observational nature. In the UK, prostate cancer is the most common hormone-related cancer in men. However, like breast cancer in women, it is comparatively rare as a clinically evident disease in men living in Asian countries. 

Babson proposed a-naphthyl phosphate as an essentially specific substrate for the activity of prostatic acid phosphatase in serum (104). However Marshall, Price, and Amador found that this substrate is not specific for the prostatic enzyme because urine of human females contain 50 times more acid a-naphthyl phosphatase than male serum and 50% as much activity as male urine. Platelets have significant activity and the serum activity can increase to abnormal values following clotting. These workers also observed elevated activities in females with skeletal metastases of the breast. In 50 hospitalized male patients who had no evidence of prostatic cancer and 25 hospitalized female patients, the incidence of false positive results was 12%, a magnitude sufficient to preclude meaningful clinical interpretation (105). 

In countries such as Japan, although the incidence of latent, small or non-infiltrative prostate cancer is similar to that found in Western countries, the incidence of invasive cancer and associated mortality is far lower (Adlercreutz and Mazur, 1997). In Japan, diets have traditionally included large amounts of soy, and it has been proposed that this may be responsible for the protective effect. To date, however, the results are inconsistent, although there may be an inverse correlation with non-fermented soy foods. The active component... 

Intervention trials confirmed this protective role of lycopene on prostate cancer risk. Three primary intervention studies evaluated the effect of lycopene supplementation on prostate cancer risk or on certain risk markers such as prostate-specific antigen (PSA) plasma concentration or oxidative alterations of leucocyte DNA. - All showed increases of plasma and prostate lycopene levels after diet supplementation with lycopene and inverse correlations between tumor incidence and risk biomarkers. 

Table 89-1 summarizes the possible factors associated with prostate cancer.2 The only widely accepted risk factors for prostate cancer are age, race/ethnicity, and family history of prostate cancer.2 The disease is rare under the age of 40 years, but the incidence increases sharply with each subsequent decade, most likely because the individual has had a lifetime exposure to testosterone, a known growth signal for the prostate.3... 

Several randomized trials have demonstrated that leuprolide and goserelin are effective agents when used alone in patients with advanced prostate cancer.19 Response rates around 80% have been reported, with a lower incidence of adverse effects compared with estrogens.19 There are no direct comparative trials of the currently available LHRH agonists or the dosage formulations, but a recent meta-analysis reported that there is no difference in efficacy or toxicity between leuprolide and goserelin. Therefore, the choice between the two usually is made based on cost and patient and physician preference for a dosing schedule. 

Hormones regulate many important bodily functions and are also associated with cancer. One of the first hints of the relationship of hormones to cancers was the observation that nuns had a greater incidence of breast cancer. This was naturally related to the nuns not having children and now we know that breast cancer may be hormone related. Since then there have been numerous studies on the use of birth control with cancer, childbirth, and most recently hormone replacement association with cancer. In males there is ongoing study of the hormones and prostate cancer. While it is clear that hormones and cancer are related, the exact characterization of this relationship is still unclear. 

---