Familial aggregation of prostate cancer in African-Americans and white Americans.
BACKGROUND
We compared the incidence of prostate cancer in first-degree family members of African-Americans with that in white Americans.


METHODS
A historical cohort design was used to enroll 330 incident cases <80 years of age that were diagnosed at the Houston VA Medical Center between June 9, 1993 and June 8, 1996. We compared incidence rates in the probands' families with the incidence rates found in contemporaneous data from the national and regional Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End-Results (SEER) program.


RESULTS
Three-hundred five probands (41% African-American) had evaluable first-degree relatives (394 African-American, 527 non-African-American). The standardized incidence ratio was 1.61 overall (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.22-2.13) and did not differ between African-American and non-African-American families: 1.58 (1.05-2.29) and 1.65 (1.06-2.45) in African-Americans and non-African-Americans, respectively.


CONCLUSIONS
The similar level of familial aggregation is evidence that the higher incidence of prostate cancer in African-Americans is not attributable to a higher prevalence of germline mutations predisposing to the disease.
Cunningham
Glenn R
GR
Department of Medicine, Veterans Affairs Medical Center and Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas 77030, USA. Cunningham.glennr@med.va.gov
Ashton
Carol M
CM
Annegers
John F
JF
Souchek
Julianne
J
Klima
Marcella
M
Miles
Brian
B
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D044383:Black People / Q000235:genetics*; D016021:Epidemiologic Studies; D020022:Genetic Predisposition to Disease; D018095:Germ-Line Mutation; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010375:Pedigree; D015995:Prevalence; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000208:ethnology* / Q000235:genetics*; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology; D014728:Veterans; D044465:White People / Q000235:genetics*; D001741:Black or African American