Telomere length and risk of glioma.
BACKGROUND
Telomere length in blood or buccal cell DNA has been associated with risk of various cancers. Glioma can be a highly malignant brain tumor and has few known risk factors. Genetic variants in or near RTEL1 and TERT, key components of telomere biology, are associated with glioma risk. Therefore, we evaluated the association between relative telomere length (RTL) and glioma in a prospective study.


METHODS
We performed a nested case-control study within the Prostate, Lung, Colorectal, and Ovarian (PLCO) Cancer Screening Trial. RTL was determined by quantitative PCR on blood or buccal cell DNA obtained at least 2 years prior to diagnosis from 101 individuals with glioma cases. Healthy controls (n=198) were matched to cases (2:1) on age, gender, smoking status, calendar year, and DNA source. Conditional logistic regression was used to investigate the association between RTL and glioma.


RESULTS
As expected, RTL declined with increasing age in both cases and controls. There was no statistically significant association between RTL and glioma overall. An analysis stratified by gender suggested that short RTL (1st tertile) in males was associated with glioma (odds ratio, [OR]=2.29, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.02-5.11); this association was not observed for females (OR=0.41, 95% CI 0.14-1.17).


CONCLUSIONS
This prospective study did not identify significant associations between RTL and glioma risk, but there may be gender-specific differences. Larger, prospective studies are needed to evaluate these findings.
Cancer Prevention Fellowship Program, Division of Cancer Prevention, National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, Rockville, MD 20892, United States.
Farzana
F
Walcott
Preetha
P
Rajaraman
Shahinaz M
SM
Gadalla
Peter D
PD
Inskip
Mark P
MP
Purdue
Demetrius
D
Albanes
Esther
E
Orr
Immaculata
I
De Vivo
Sharon A
SA
Savage
D000368:Aged; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D004247:DNA / Q000235:genetics*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D005910:Glioma / Q000209:etiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D011379:Prognosis; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D059505:Telomere Homeostasis / Q000235:genetics*
D004247:DNA
95% confidence interval; CI; Cancer risk; Epidemiology; Glioma; OR; PLCO; Prostate, Lung, Colorectal, and Ovarian Cancer Screening Trial; Qpcr; RTL; Telomere length; odds ratio; quantitative PCR; relative telomere length