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Association between selenium intake and breast cancer risk: results from the Women’s Health Initiative

  • Epidemiology
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Abstract

Purpose

It has been hypothesized that selenium (Se) can prevent cancer, and that Se deficiency may be associated with an increased risk of breast cancer. However, findings from epidemiological studies have been inconsistent. The objective of this study was to assess the association between Se intake and risk of breast cancer in the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI).

Methods

This study included 145,033 postmenopausal women 50–79 years who completed baseline questionnaires between October 1993 and December 1998, which addressed dietary and supplemental Se intake and breast cancer risk factors. The association between baseline Se intake and incident breast cancer was examined in Cox proportional hazards analysis.

Results

During a mean follow-up of 15.5 years, 9487 cases of invasive breast cancer were identified. Total Se (highest versus lowest quartile: HR 1.00, 95% CI 0.92–1.09, Ptrend = 0.66), dietary Se (highest versus lowest quartile: HR 0.99, 95% CI 0.89–1.08, Ptrend = 0.61), and supplemental Se (yes versus no: HR 0.99, 95% CI 0.95–1.03) were not associated with breast cancer incidence.

Conclusions

This study indicates that Se intake is not associated with incident breast cancer among postmenopausal women in the United States. Further studies are needed to confirm our findings by using biomarkers such as toenail Se to reduce the potential for misclassification of Se status.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the Women’s Health Initiative investigators, staff, and the trial participants for their outstanding dedication. The WHI program is funded by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services through contracts HHSN268201600018C, HHSN268201600001C, HHSN268201600002C, HHSN268-201600003C, and HHSN268201600004C. Women’s Health Initiative Investigators: Program Office: (National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, Bethesda, Maryland) Jacques Rossouw, Shari Ludlam, Joan McGowan, Leslie Ford, and Nancy Geller; Clinical Coordinating Center: (Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA) Garnet Anderson, Ross Prentice, Andrea LaCroix, and Charles Kooperberg; Investigators and Academic Centers: (Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA) JoAnn E. Manson; (MedStar Health Research Institute/Howard University, Washington, DC) Barbara V. Howard; (Stanford Prevention Research Center, Stanford, CA) Marcia L. Stefanick; (The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH) Rebecca Jackson; (University of Arizona, Tucson/Phoenix, AZ) Cynthia A. Thomson; (University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY) Jean Wactawski-Wende; (University of Florida, Gainesville/Jacksonville, FL) Marian Limacher; (University of Iowa, Iowa City/Davenport, IA) Jennifer Robinson; (University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA) Lewis Kuller; (Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC) Sally Shumaker; (University of Nevada, Reno, NV) Robert Brunner; Women’s Health Initiative Memory Study: (Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC) Mark Espeland.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Social Development and Public Policy, Beijing Normal University, 19 Xinjiekouwai Street, Beijing, 100875, China

    Dan Guo & Xiaoyun Liang

  2. Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, School of Public Health, Indiana University Bloomington, 1025 E 7th street, Bloomington, IN, 47405, USA

    Michael Hendryx

  3. Division of Preventive Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, 900 Commonwealth Avenue, 3rd Fl, Boston, MA, 02215, USA

    JoAnn E. Manson

  4. Department of Epidemiology, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University Irving Medical Center, 622 W. 168th Street, New York, NY, 10032, USA

    Ka He

  5. Department of Epidemiology and Prevention, School of Medical, Wake Forest University, 475 Vine Street, Winston-Salem, NC, 27157, USA

    Mara Z. Vitolins

  6. Department of Dermatology, Brown Alpert Medical School, 336 Eddy Street, Providence, RI, 02903, USA

    Yueyao Li

  7. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Indiana University Bloomington, 1025 E 7th street, Bloomington, IN, 47405, USA

    Juhua Luo

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  1. Dan Guo
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  3. Xiaoyun Liang
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Correspondence to Xiaoyun Liang.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study as detailed in Women’s Health Initiative study protocol.

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Guo, D., Hendryx, M., Liang, X. et al. Association between selenium intake and breast cancer risk: results from the Women’s Health Initiative. Breast Cancer Res Treat 183, 217–226 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10549-020-05764-6

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