Importance and Risk Prediction of ABO Blood Group and Rh Factor in Papillary Thyroid Cancer

Abstract

Objective: There are limited data in the literature regarding the potentialrelationship between thyroid cancer and ABO blood types and Rh factor.The aim of our study was to investigate whether papillary thyroid cancer(PTC) is associated with blood type.Materials and Methods: The present study included patients who presented to Dicle University Faculty of Medicine between June 2009 andDecember 2020 and were diagnosed with PTC as a result of postoperative(thyroidectomy) histopathological analysis. The control group consisted ofindividuals whose blood type was analyzed at a random blood center.Results: Of the 223 patients diagnosed with PTC, 163 (73.1%) were females and 60 (26.9%) were males. In the comparison of patients based onABO blood types and Rh factor, A Rh positive blood type was found 31%less frequently in the PTC group compared with the control group, and thusit was associated with a lower risk of PTC (OR:0.69; 95% Confidence Interval: 0.50–0.96, p=0.029).Conclusions: In our study, we found A Rh positive blood type to be significantly less frequent among patients with PTC. A Rh positive blood type canbe considered as a protective factor indicating a reduced risk of PTC.