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Risk of colon cancer associated with a family history of cancer or colorectal polyps: The Diet, Activity, and Reproduction in Colon Cancer Study
Author(s) -
Kerber Richard A.,
Slattery Martha L.,
Potter John D.,
Caan Bette J.,
Edwards Sandra L.
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
international journal of cancer
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.475
H-Index - 234
eISSN - 1097-0215
pISSN - 0020-7136
DOI - 10.1002/(sici)1097-0215(19981005)78:2<157::aid-ijc6>3.0.co;2-y
Subject(s) - colorectal cancer , family history , medicine , cancer , logistic regression , odds ratio , oncology , incidence (geometry) , hazard ratio , risk factor , proportional hazards model , gynecology , confidence interval , physics , optics
The Diet, Activity, and Reproduction in Colon Cancer (DARCC) study is a large, multi‐center case‐control study of colon cancer. We examined family histories of cancer among first‐degree relatives obtained by computer‐assisted in‐person interviews from the DARCC to study the impact of family histories of several cancers and colorectal polyps on colon cancer risk. We examined familial cancer risks both by treating a family history of polyps or cancer as a covariate in a logistic regression model, and by comparing cancer or polyp incidence among relatives of cases to incidence among relatives of controls in a proportional hazards model. There were few differences between the odds ratios (OR) or confidence intervals (CI) generated from logistic regression models and the hazard rate ratios (HRR) generated from the proportional hazards models. Overall, the OR of colon cancer among subjects with a family history of colorectal cancer was 1.77. There were only minor differences in risk by sex, age and subsite. A family history of colorectal polyps also increased risk by about the same amount as a family history of colorectal cancer. The increased risk associated with a family history of polyps did not appear to decrease with age. Int. J. Cancer 78:157–160, 1998.© 1998 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.