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Trichomonas vaginalis infection and risk of prostate cancer: associations by disease aggressiveness and race/ethnicity in the PLCO Trial

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Abstract

Purpose

Results from previous sero-epidemiologic studies of Trichomonas vaginalis infection and prostate cancer (PCa) support a positive association between this sexually transmitted infection and aggressive PCa. However, findings from previous studies are not entirely consistent, and only one has investigated the possible relation between T. vaginalis seropositivity and PCa in African-American men who are at highest risk of both infection and PCa. Therefore, we examined this possible relation in the Prostate, Lung, Colorectal, and Ovarian Cancer Screening Trial, including separate analyses for aggressive PCa and African-American men.

Methods

We included a sample of participants from a previous nested case–control study of PCa, as well as all additional Caucasian, aggressive, and African-American cases diagnosed since the previous study (total n = 438 Gleason 7 Caucasian cases, 487 more advanced Caucasian cases (≥Gleason 8 or stage III/IV), 201 African-American cases, and 1216 controls). We tested baseline sera for T. vaginalis antibodies.

Results

No associations were observed for risk of Gleason 7 (odds ratio (OR) = 0.87, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.55–1.37) or more advanced (OR = 0.90, 95% CI 0.58–1.38) PCa in Caucasian men, or for risk of any PCa (OR = 1.06, 95% CI 0.67–1.68) in African-American men.

Conclusions

Our findings do not support an association between T. vaginalis infection and PCa.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank the National Cancer Institute (NCI) for providing the human material collected by PLCO; Karen Pettit, Sally Larson, and Amy Hutchinson for performing or coordinating serum specimen retrieval and aliquoting; Mike Furr, Craig Williams, and Ryan Noble for managing study data; Calvin Neace and Patrick A. Joyce for performing T. vaginalis antibody testing; Drs. Raphael P. Viscidi, Francis K. Lee, Yun F. Wang, and Denise Whitby and their staff for performing or supervising STI testing in the previous nested case–control study in PLCO; and Dr. Graham A. Colditz for helpful review of our NCI Grant. PLCO is supported by the Intramural Research Program of the Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, and by contracts from the Division of Cancer Prevention, NCI, National Institutes of Health, the Department of Health and Human Services. This study was funded by NCI Grant R03 CA143949; the Intramural Research Program of the Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, NCI, the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Health and Human Services; the Barnes-Jewish Hospital Foundation; and the Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Center.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Public Health Sciences, Department of Surgery, Washington University School of Medicine, 600 S. Taylor Ave., Box 8100, Rm 208S, St. Louis, MO, 63110, USA

    Miguelle Marous, Anke C. Winter & Siobhan Sutcliffe

  2. Occupational and Environmental Epidemiology Branch, Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA

    Wen-Yi Huang

  3. Infections and Immunoepidemiology Branch, Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Bethesda, MD, USA

    Charles S. Rabkin

  4. Division of Epidemiology, Department of Population Health, New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA

    Richard B. Hayes

  5. School of Molecular Biosciences, College of Veterinary Medicine, Washington State University, Pullman, WA, USA

    John F. Alderete

  6. Department of Biostatistics, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the Channing Division of Network Medicine, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Bernard Rosner

  7. Division of Urological Surgery, Department of Surgery, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO, USA

    Robert L. Grubb III

Authors
  1. Miguelle Marous
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  2. Wen-Yi Huang
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  3. Charles S. Rabkin
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  4. Richard B. Hayes
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  5. John F. Alderete
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  6. Bernard Rosner
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  7. Robert L. Grubb III
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  8. Anke C. Winter
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  9. Siobhan Sutcliffe
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Siobhan Sutcliffe.

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Marous, M., Huang, WY., Rabkin, C.S. et al. Trichomonas vaginalis infection and risk of prostate cancer: associations by disease aggressiveness and race/ethnicity in the PLCO Trial. Cancer Causes Control 28, 889–898 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10552-017-0919-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10552-017-0919-6

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