Abstract D007: Mammographic breast density and acculturation: Longitudinal analysis in Chinese immigrants

Abstract

Abstract Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women, regardless of race or ethnicity. Unlike other racial and ethnic groups, breast cancer rates in Asian American women have steadily increased over the past several decades. The increase among recent migrants might be partly due to the adoption of the behaviors and values of the mainstream culture. We tested the hypothesis that higher level of acculturation was associated with higher mammographic breast density (MBD), an indicator of breast cancer risk, using data from a 2006-2010 longitudinal study of 426 premenopausal Chinese immigrant women in Philadelphia. MBD, including dense area, non-dense area, and percent density, was calculated using a computer assisted method. An abridged version of the General Ethnicity Questionnaire – American version provided a measure of acculturation. We used generalized estimating equations (GEE) to account for repeated observations and adjusted for age, type of mammographic image (film or digital), body mass index, months of breastfeeding, number of live births, age at first birth, and menopausal stage (pre, early peri, late peri, and post). At baseline, the mean age of participants was 43.9 years (SD=4.5), mean length of U.S. residence was 7.5 years (SD=4.8), and mean age at migration was 36.4 years (SD=6.4). GEE models using 1,110 observations from the 426 participants showed no significant associations between acculturation and MBD (percent density β=0.32, p=0.54; dense area β=0.28, p=0.57; and non-dense area β=-0.42, p=0.60). Our findings are consistent with an emerging body of research suggesting that acculturation measures are insufficient to distinguish levels of breast cancer risk in immigrant women, given changes in immigration patterns and economic development in sending countries. Future work should consider other factors, including behavioral, environmental and epigenetic factors or changes in reproductive patterns, that may have a greater effect on MBD than acculturation-related behaviors in adulthood. Citation Format: Rebeca Almeida, Celia Byrne, Carolyn Y. Fang, Marilyn Tseng. Mammographic breast density and acculturation: Longitudinal analysis in Chinese immigrants [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the Twelfth AACR Conference on the Science of Cancer Health Disparities in Racial/Ethnic Minorities and the Medically Underserved; 2019 Sep 20-23; San Francisco, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2020;29(6 Suppl_2):Abstract nr D007.