Sex steroid hormones in young manhood and the risk of subsequent prostate cancer: a longitudinal study in African-Americans and Caucasians (United States).
OBJECTIVE
To investigate the relation of sex hormone levels in young adults to subsequent prostate cancer risk.


METHODS
From 1959 to 1967, the Child Health and Development Studies collected sera from 10,442 men (median age: 34 years) and followed them for a median of 32 years. In this analysis, we selected 119 African-Americans and 206 Caucasians diagnosed with prostate cancer during the follow-up period. Two prostate cancer-free men were chosen to match each prostate cancer case on race and birth year. We compared the levels of testosterone, estradiol, and sex hormone-binding globulin in cases to those of their matched controls using conditional logistic regression.


RESULTS
There was no significant association between absolute levels of sex hormones in youth and prostate cancer risk in either race. However, among Caucasians, but not African-Americans, prostate cancer risk was positively associated with the ratio of total testosterone to total estradiol (odds ratio relating the fourth to the first quartile: 3.01; 95% confidence interval: 1.42-6.39).


CONCLUSIONS
The association between testosterone to estradiol ratio and prostate cancer risk in young Caucasians is consistent with similar findings in older Caucasians. The absence of this association in African-Americans needs confirmation in other data involving larger numbers of African-Americans.
Tsai
Chiaojung J
CJ
Department of Health Research and Policy, Stanford University School of Medicine, HRP Redwood Building, Room T204, Stanford, CA 94305-5405, USA.
Cohn
Barbara A
BA
Cirillo
Piera M
PM
Feldman
David
D
Stanczyk
Frank Z
FZ
Whittemore
Alice S
AS
D000328:Adult; D001741:Black or African American; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D012739:Gonadal Steroid Hormones / Q000097:blood*; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000097:blood* / Q000453:epidemiology*; D012307:Risk Factors; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D014481:United States; D044465:White People
D012739:Gonadal Steroid Hormones