Alcohol consumption and risk of lung cancer: the Framingham Study.
BACKGROUND
Reports on the association between alcohol consumption and the risk of lung cancer have been inconsistent. The purpose of this study was to assess this association in a cohort study.


METHODS
This study included 4265 participants in the original population-based Framingham Study cohort and 4973 subjects in the offspring cohort. Alcohol consumption data were collected periodically for both cohorts. We used the risk sets method to match control subjects to each case patient based on age, sex, smoking variables, and year of birth. We used a conditional logistic regression model to estimate the relative risk of lung cancer according to alcohol consumption.


RESULTS
Alcohol consumption was generally light to moderate (i.e., <12 g/day) in both cohorts. During mean follow-ups of 32.8 years in the original and 16.2 years in the offspring cohorts, 269 cases of lung cancer occurred. In categories of total alcohol consumption of 0, 0.1-12, 12.1-24, and greater than 24 g/day, the crude incidence rates of lung cancer were 7.4, 13.6, 16.4, and 25.2 cases per 10 000 person-years, respectively, in the original cohort and 6.6, 4.3, 7.9, and 12.3 cases per 10 000 person-years, respectively, in the offspring cohort. However, after adjustment for age, sex, pack-years of smoking, smoking status, and year of birth in a multivariable conditional logistic regression model, relative risks for lung cancer from the lowest to the highest category of alcohol consumption were 1.0 (referent), 1.0 (95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.5 to 2.1), 1.0 (95% CI = 0.5 to 2.3), and 1.1 (95% CI = 0.5 to 2.3), respectively, in the original cohort and 1.0, 1.4 (95% CI = 0.5 to 3.6), 1.1 (95% CI = 0.3 to 3.6), and 2.0 (95% CI = 0.7 to 5.7), respectively, in the offspring cohort.


CONCLUSIONS
Alcohol consumption among subjects in the Framingham Study, most of whom were light to moderate drinkers, was not statistically significantly associated with the risk of lung cancer.
Djoussé
Luc
L
Section of Preventive Medicine and Epidemiology, Evans Department of Medicine, Boston University School of Medicine, Boston, MA 02118, USA. ldjousse@bu.edu
Dorgan
Joanne F
JF
Zhang
Yuqing
Y
Schatzkin
Arthur
A
Hood
Maggie
M
D'Agostino
Ralph B
RB
Copenhafer
Donna L
DL
Kreger
Bernard E
BE
Ellison
R Curtis
RC
D000230:Adenocarcinoma / Q000209:etiology; D000328:Adult; D000428:Alcohol Drinking / Q000009:adverse effects*; D015331:Cohort Studies; D016001:Confidence Intervals; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008175:Lung Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology*; D008297:Male; D008404:Massachusetts / Q000453:epidemiology; D008875:Middle Aged; D016017:Odds Ratio; D018570:Risk Assessment; D012307:Risk Factors; D012907:Smoking / Q000009:adverse effects; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires