Estrogen receptor expression in pancreas cancer - is there a future for hormonal therapy?

Abstract

s / Pancreatology 14 (2014) S1eS129 S71 Background: Several studies have examined leukocyte telomere length (LTL) as a possible predictor for cancer at various organ sites. The hypothesis originallymotivatingmany of these studieswas that shorter telomereswould be associated with an increase in cancer risk, the results of epidemiologic studies have been inconsistent, however, and suggested positive, negative, or null associations. So far, only two studieshave addressed the associationof LTL in relation to pancreatic cancer risk and the results are contrasting. Aims: Our aim was to further our understanding on the relation between LTL and Pancreatic cancer risk. Patients & methods: We measured LTL in a prospective study of 331 pancreatic cancer cases and 331 controls in the context of the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC). Results: We observed that the mean LTL was higher in cases (0.59±0.20) than in controls (0.57±0.17), although this difference was not statistically significant (p1⁄40.07), and a basic logistic regression model showed no association of LTL with pancreas cancer risk. When adjusting for levels of glycated hemoglobin and C-peptide, however, there was a weakly positive association between longer LTL and pancreatic cancer risk (for LTL as a continuous variable, OR1⁄41.13; 95% CI 1.01-1.27). Conclusion: Taken together, the results from our study do not support LTL as a uniform and strong predictor of pancreatic cancer but can provide insights into telomere dynamics.