An Exploration of Shared Genetic Risk Factors Between Periodontal Disease and Cancers: A Prospective Co-Twin Study

Biologic mechanisms underlying associations of periodontal disease with cancers remain unknown. The authors propose that both conditions share common genetic risk factors. They analyzed associations between baseline periodontal disease, measured by questionnaire-recorded tooth mobility, and incident cancers, identified by linkage with national registries, between 1963 and 2004 in 15,333 Swedish twins. The authors used co-twin analyses to control for familial factors and undertook analyses restricted to monozygotic twins to further control for confounding by genetic factors. They observed 4,361 cancer cases over 548,913 person-years. After adjustment for covariates, baseline periodontal disease was associated with increased risk of several cancers ranging from 15% for total cancer (proportional hazard ratio (HR) = 1.15, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.01, 1.32) to 120% for corpus uterine cancer (HR = 2.20, 95% CI: 1.16, 4.18). Periodontal disease was also associated with increased risk of colorectal (HR = 1.62, 95% CI: 1.13, 2.33), pancreatic (HR = 2.06, 95% CI: 1.14, 3.75), and prostate (HR = 1.47, 95% CI: 1.04, 2.07) cancers. In co-twin analyses, dizygotic twins with baseline periodontal disease showed a 50% increase in total cancer risk (HR = 1.50, 95% CI: 1.04, 2.17), but in monozygotic twins this association was markedly attenuated (HR = 1.07, 95% CI: 0.63, 1.81). Similar patterns emerged for digestive tract cancers, suggesting that shared genetic risk factors may partially explain associations between periodontal disease and cancers.