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Diet diversity and the risk of oral and pharyngeal cancer

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Abstract

Background

Diet diversity has been recommended to achieve a healthy diet and prevent cancer.

Aim of the study

The relation between diet diversity (i.e., variety in food intake computed as the total number of foods consumed at least once per week) and the risk of oral and pharyngeal cancer was investigated using data from a multicentric case-control study carried out between 1991 and 2005 in Italy.

Methods

Cases were 805 patients with histologically confirmed incident cancers of the oral cavity and pharynx, and controls were 2,081 patients admitted for acute, non-neoplastic diseases, unrelated to tobacco or alcohol consumption.

Results

A significant inverse association was observed with total diet diversity. The multivariate odds ratio (OR), adjusted for education, tobacco and alcohol, was 0.78 (95% confidence interval, CI 0.61–0.98) for subjects in the highest tertile of diversity. Inverse relations were found also for diversity within vegetables (OR = 0.62; 95% CI 0.49–0.78) and fruits (OR = 0.67; 95% CI 0.53–0.86).

Conclusions

This study suggests that a more diversified, and particularly a diet varied in vegetables and fruit, is a favourable indicator of oral and pharyngeal cancer risk, independently from the major recognised risk factors, i.e. alcohol and tobacco consumption.

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Acknowledgments

This work was conducted with the contribution of the Italian Association for Cancer Research, and the Italian League Against Cancer. The work in this paper was undertaken while CLV was a Senior Fellow at International Agency for Research on Cancer. The authors thank Ms I. Garimoldi for editorial assistance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche “Mario Negri”, via Giuseppe La Masa 19, 20156, Milan, Italy

    Werner Garavello, Laura Giordano,  Cristina Bosetti, Eva Negri, Alessandra Tavani & Carlo La Vecchia

  2. Clinica Otorinolaringoiatrica, DNTB, Università Milano-Bicocca, Monza, Italy

    Werner Garavello

  3. Centro di Riferimento Oncologico, Aviano, PN, Italy

    Renato Talamini

  4. Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, European Institute of Oncology, Milan, Italy

    Patrick Maisonneuve

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

    Silvia Franceschi

  6. Istituto di Statistica Medica e Biometria, “G.A. Maccacaro”, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano, Italy

    Carlo La Vecchia

Authors
  1. Werner Garavello
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  2. Laura Giordano
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  3. Cristina Bosetti
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  4. Renato Talamini
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  5. Eva Negri
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  6. Alessandra Tavani
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  7. Patrick Maisonneuve
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  8. Silvia Franceschi
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  9. Carlo La Vecchia
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Cristina Bosetti.

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Garavello, W., Giordano, L., Bosetti, C. et al. Diet diversity and the risk of oral and pharyngeal cancer. Eur J Nutr 47, 280–284 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00394-008-0722-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00394-008-0722-y

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