Inconsistent Association Between Renal Cell Carcinoma Risk, Alcohol Intake

the Cancer Therapy Advisor take:

Based on the findings of epidemiological studies, there is thought to be a relationship between an individual’s alcohol intake and a reduction in risk of renal cell carcinoma. There have been inconsistent findings, however, when it comes to the specifics on patient gender and the type of alcohol consumed.

Researchers worked with the Prostate, Lung, Colorectal, and Ovarian Cancer Screen Trial to analyze data in an effort to increase the understanding of the way in which alcohol intake and risk of renal cell carcinoma are related. Researchers followed up with patients in the analytic cohort (107,998 patients) through 2010 to identify patients with renal cell carcinoma (408 patients).

Researchers then calculated hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals for the consumption of alcohol via Cox regression and adjusted for age, race, sex, study center, smoking status, body mass index, and hypertension. 

Their findings revealed that patients with a higher rate of alcohol intake were associated with a reduced risk of renal cell carcinoma compared with patients who did not drink (>9.75 g day-1 : hazard ratio: 0.67; 95% confidence interval: 0.50,0.89; P trend=0.002). The association patterns were deemed to be similar across sex and type of alcohol consumed.

There was also determined to be a increased risk of renal cell carcinoma associated with ever smokers when the data was stratified by smoking status (hazard ratio: 0.51; 95% confidence interval: 0.36,0.73; P trend<0.0001). 

The findings associated with smoking, however, require further study and confirmation. The researchers conclude that their study demonstrates that alcohol intake is associated with a reduction of renal cell carcinoma risk and that this is true despite gender or type of alcohol.