title: Association between the XRCC3 Thr241Met Polymorphism
  and Gastrointestinal Cancer Risk: A Meta-Analysis
abstract: Background: The x-ray repair cross-complementing group 3 (XRCC3) encodes a protein involved in the
  homologous recombination repair (HRR) pathway for double-strand DNA repair. Associations of the XRCC3 Thr241Met
  polymorphism with various cancers have been widely reported. However, published data on links between XRCC3
  Thr241Met and gastrointestinal (GI) cancer risk are inconsistent. Objective and Methods: A meta-analysis was
  conducted to characterize the relationship between XRCC3 Thr241Met polymorphisms and GI cancer risk. Pooled
  odds ratios (ORs) and 95.0% confidence intervals were assessed using random- or fixed- effect models for 28.0 relevant
  articles with 30.0 studies containing 7,649.0 cases and 11,123.0 controls. Results: The results of the overall meta-analysis
  suggested a borderline association between the XRCC3 Thr241Met polymorphism and GI cancer susceptibility (T vs.
  C: OR=1.18, 9 % CI=1.0–1.4, POR=0.04; TT vs. CT+CC: OR=1.3, 95 % CI=1.0–1.6, POR=0.04). After removing
  studies not conforming to Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium (HWE), however, this association disappeared (T vs. C:
  OR=1.00, 95 % CI=0.9–1.1, POR=0.96; TT vs. CT+CC: OR=0.9, 95 % CI=0.8–1.1, POR=0.72). When stratified by
  ethnicity, source of controls or cancer type, although some associations between XRCC3 Thr241Met polymorphism
  and GI cancer susceptibility were detected, these associations no longer existed after removing studies not conforming
  to HWE. Conclusion: Our meta-analysis suggests that the XRCC3 Thr241Met polymorphism is not associated with
  risk of GI cancer based on current evidence.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Genetics, Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences, Yazd, Iran. Email:ahmadtajehmiri@kums.ac.ir.
authors.forename: Mohammad Hossein
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Sahami-Fard
authors.forename: Ali Reza
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Mousa Mayali
authors.forename: Ahmad
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Tajehmiri
keywords: X-ray repair cross complementing group 3- polymorphism; gastrointestinal cancer; Meta-analysis