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Family history and lung cancer risk: international multicentre case–control study in Eastern and Central Europe and meta-analyses

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Abstract

Lung cancer is the most common neoplastic disease in Eastern and Central Europe. The role of hereditary factors in lung carcinogenesis is not fully understood. Family history (FH) of lung cancer and other tobacco-related cancers might be a strong predictor of the lung cancer risk. We investigated family history of cancer among first-degree relatives of 2,861 patients with lung cancer and 3,118 controls from the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, and United Kingdom within the IARC Multicenter Case–Control Study. Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% CI were calculated using logistic regression, adjusting for age, gender, study center, education, tobacco smoking, and number of first-degree relatives. In addition, we conducted a meta-analysis of 41 studies on FH of cancer and lung cancer risk. Positive FH of lung cancer increased risk of lung cancer with OR of 1.63 (95%CI: 1.31–2.01), and having two or more affected relatives with lung cancer further increased the risk of lung cancer with OR 3.60 (95%CI: 1.56–8.31). Among subjects aged less than 50, the OR for FH of lung cancer was 2.08 (95%CI: 1.18–3.63). The associations were generally stronger for squamous cell carcinoma and large cell carcinoma subtypes. Heterogeneity in results was not found with respect to smoking status and gender. A significant association was not observed for FH of other smoking-related tumors. The results of meta-analysis were consistent with that of our study with regard to young onset, non-smokers and histology. FH of lung cancer is a predictor of an increased risk of lung cancer, especially in subjects aged less than 50.

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Acknowledgments

Financial support from European Commission (DG-XII), contract no. IC15-CT96-0313 is gratefully acknowledged. The Warsaw part of the study was supported by local grant from The Polish State Committee for Scientific Research, grant no. SPUB-M-COPERNICUS/P-05/DZ-30/99/2000.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Cancer Epidemiology and Prevention, The M. Skłodowska-Cure Cancer Center and Institute of Oncology, WK Roentgena 5, 02-781, Warsaw, Poland

    Jolanta Lissowska & Joanna Dąbek

  2. Department of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, Masaryk Memorial Cancer Institute, Brno, Czech Republic

    Lenka Foretova

  3. Institute of Carcinogenesis, Cancer Research Center, Moscow, Russia

    David Zaridze

  4. Department of Epidemiology, Institute of Occupational Medicine, Lodz, Poland

    Neonila Szeszenia-Dabrowska

  5. Division of Environmental Health Assessment, National Institute of Environmental Health, Budapest, Hungary

    Peter Rudnai

  6. Regional Authority of Public Health, Banska Bystrica, Slovakia

    Eleonora Fabianova

  7. Roy Castle Lung Cancer Research Programme, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, United Kingdom

    Adrian Cassidy

  8. Institute of Hygiene, Public Health, Health Services and Management, Bucharest, Romania

    Dana Mates

  9. Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology, First Faculty of Medicine, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic

    Vladimir Bencko

  10. Department of Preventive Medicine, Palacky University Faculty of Medicine, Olomouc, Czech Republic

    Vladimir Janout

  11. International Agency for Research on Cancer, Lyon, France

    Rayjean J. Hung, Paul Brennan & Paolo Boffetta

  12. Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute of Mount Sinai Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada

    Rayjean J. Hung

  13. The Tisch Cancer Institute, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA

    Paolo Boffetta

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  1. Jolanta Lissowska
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Correspondence to Jolanta Lissowska.

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Lissowska, J., Foretova, L., Dąbek, J. et al. Family history and lung cancer risk: international multicentre case–control study in Eastern and Central Europe and meta-analyses. Cancer Causes Control 21, 1091–1104 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10552-010-9537-2

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