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Cancer Causes & Control
Published in: Cancer Causes & Control 7/2011

01-07-2011 | Original paper

Association between psoriasis and incident cancer: the Iowa’s Women’s Health Study

Authors: Anna E. Prizment, Alvaro Alonso, Aaron R. Folsom, Rehana L. Ahmed, Beth A. Virnig, Erin M. Warshaw, Kristin E. Anderson

Published in: Cancer Causes & Control | Issue 7/2011

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Abstract

Introduction

Studies have reported higher cancer risk in individuals with psoriasis, a chronic inflammatory autoimmune disease; however, adjustment for potential confounders was lacking.

Methods

We examined the association of psoriasis with cancer incidence in 32,910 women after age 65 in the IWHS cohort linked to Medicare. Psoriasis was defined as: 2+ psoriasis claims from any Medicare file during 1991–2004 or 1+ psoriasis claim from a dermatologist (n = 719). Severe psoriasis was defined as 4+ psoriasis claims from a dermatologist in any year (n = 121). Cox proportional hazards regression, with psoriasis as a time-dependent variable was conducted to calculate hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) of total (n = 6,488), breast (n = 2,066), lung (n = 742), and colon cancers (n = 947).

Results

With age-adjustment, psoriasis (yes vs. no) was associated with increased risk of lung 1.9 (95% CI: 1.2–3.0), colon 1.6 (95% CI: 1.1–2.5), and total cancer 1.2 (95% CI, 1.0–1.4). After further adjustment for smoking, body mass index, education, physical activity, and hormone therapy use, only the association for colon cancer remained statistically significant (HR = 1.6, 95% CI: 1.0–2.4) and was stronger for severe psoriasis.

Conclusion

The observed association between psoriasis and colon cancer may reflect inflammatory or unidentified processes.
Footnotes
1
E. Warshaw, Department of Dermatology, University of Minnesota, October, 2009, personal communication.
 
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Metadata
Title
Association between psoriasis and incident cancer: the Iowa’s Women’s Health Study
Authors
Anna E. Prizment
Alvaro Alonso
Aaron R. Folsom
Rehana L. Ahmed
Beth A. Virnig
Erin M. Warshaw
Kristin E. Anderson
Publication date
01-07-2011
Publisher
Springer Netherlands
Published in
Cancer Causes & Control / Issue 7/2011
Print ISSN: 0957-5243
Electronic ISSN: 1573-7225
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10552-011-9773-0

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