Thakral, Abhinav and Lee, John Jw and Hou, Tianzhichao and Hueniken, Katrina and Dudding, Tom and Gormley, Mark and Virani, Shama and Olshan, Andrew and Diergaarde, Brenda and Ness, Andrew R and Waterboer, Tim and Smith-Byrne, Karl and Brennan, Paul and Hayes, D Neil and Sanderson, Eleanor and Brown, M Catherine and Huang, Sophie and Bratman, Scott V and Spreafico, Anna and De Almeida, John and Davies, Joel C and Bierut, Laura and Macfarlane, Gary J and Lagiou, Pagona and Lagiou, Areti and Polesel, Jerry and Agudo, Antonio and Alemany, Laia and Ahrens, Wolfgang and Healy, Claire M and Conway, David I and Nygard, Mari and Canova, Cristina and Holcatova, Ivana and Richiardi, Lorenzo and Znaor, Ariana and Goldstein, David P and Hung, Rayjean J and Xu, Wei and Liu, Geoffrey and Espin-Garcia, Osvaldo (2024) Smoking and alcohol by HPV status in head and neck cancer: a Mendelian randomization study. Nature Communications, 15, 7835. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-51679-x.
External website: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-51679-x
HPV-positive and HPV-negative head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) are recognized as distinct entities. There remains uncertainty surrounding the causal effects of smoking and alcohol on the development of these two cancer types. Here we perform multivariable Mendelian randomization (MR) to evaluate the causal effects of smoking and alcohol on the risk of HPV-positive and HPV-negative HNSCC in 3431 cases and 3469 controls. Lifetime smoking exposure, as measured by the Comprehensive Smoking Index (CSI), is associated with increased risk of both HPV-negative HNSCC (OR = 3.03, 95%CI:1.75-5.24, P = 7.00E-05) and HPV-positive HNSCC (OR = 2.73, 95%CI:1.39-5.36, P = 0.003). Drinks Per Week is also linked with increased risk of both HPV-negative HNSCC (OR = 7.72, 95%CI:3.63-16.4, P = 1.00E-07) and HPV-positive HNSCC (OR = 2.66, 95%CI:1.06-6.68, P = 0.038). Smoking and alcohol independently increase the risk of both HPV-positive and HPV-negative HNSCC. These findings have important implications for understanding the modifying risk factors between HNSCC subtypes.
B Substances > Tobacco (cigarette smoking)
G Health and disease > State of health > Physical health
G Health and disease > Substance use disorder (addiction) > Multiple substance use (Poly-drug /Poly-substance)
G Health and disease > Pathologic process > Cancer
J Health care, prevention, harm reduction and treatment > Risk and protective factors > Risk factors
VA Geographic area > International
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