Previous work suggests that a “western” dietary pattern increases risk for prostate cancer.  But most previous studies on diet and prostate cancer focus on very specific parts of the diet, such as its fat or vitamin A content.  Whether overall dietary patterns are associated with prostate cancer risk has not been studied before.

The objectives of these analyses were to identify common dietary patterns in a nationally representative sample of U.S. men and to examine the associations of those patterns with prostate cancer risk.  We used prospective data from the nationally representative US Health Examination Epidemiologic Follow-up Study.  Among 3,779 men followed from 1982-4 to 1992, 136 incident cases were identified.  We used principal components analysis on responses to a 105-item dietary questionnaire to identify dietary patterns, and we calculated pattern scores to quantify level of intake of each pattern identified (for SAS program, click here).

Three distinct patterns were identified: a vegetable-fruit pattern, a red meat-starch pattern characterized by red meats, potatoes, cheese, salty snacks, and desserts, and a southern pattern characterized by such foods as cornbread, grits, sweet potatoes, okra, beans, and rice.  In adjusted proportional hazards models, prostate cancer risk was not associated with the vegetable-fruit or red meat-starch pattern, but higher intake of the southern pattern showed a reduction in risk (3^rd vs. 1^st tertile relative risk = 0.6, 95% confidence interval: 0.4, 1.1;  trend p = 0.08) that approached statistical significance.  The inverse association was observed in black and non-black men and was not attributable to intake of any individual foods or nutrients.

A southern dietary pattern may reflect a history of living in the South and serve as an integrative marker of sunlight exposure and protection through 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D production.  Further evaluation and better characterization of the pattern would offer more information on potentially beneficial features of the diet or its associated lifestyle.

Citation:
Tseng M, Breslow RA, DeVellis RF, Ziegler, RG.  Dietary patterns and prostate cancer risk in the NHEFS cohort.  Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 13: 71-77, 2004.

This work is funded by USPHS grant CA-06927 from the National Institutes of Health, grant IRG-92-027 from the American Cancer Society, grant DAMD17-01-0057 from the Department of Defense, and an appropriation from the Commonweath of Pennsylvania.
 

Last updated February 26, 2004.