Alcohol consumption and prostate cancer risk: a meta-analysis of the dose-risk relation
European Journal of Cancer Prevention, 05/31/2012
Rota M et al. – This comprehensive meta-analysis provided no evidence of a material association between alcohol drinking and prostate cancer, even at high doses.
Methods- We investigated the risk of prostate cancer at different levels of alcohol consumption, by conducting a meta-analysis of epidemiological studies.
- We performed a literature search using PubMed of all case–control and cohort studies published as original articles in English up to December 2010.
- We identified 50 case–control and 22 cohort studies, including a total of 52 899 prostate cancer cases.
- We derived pooled meta-analytic estimates using random-effects models, taking into account the correlation between estimates.
- We performed a dose–risk analysis using nonlinear random-effects meta-regression models.
- The overall relative risk for any alcohol drinking compared with non/occasional drinking was 1.06 [95% confidence interval (CI), 1.01–1.10].
- The relative risks were 1.05 (95% CI, 1.02–1.08), 1.06 (95% CI, 1.01–1.11), and 1.08 (95% CI, 0.97–1.20) for light (≤1 drink/day), moderate (>1 to <4 drinks/day), and heavy alcohol drinking (>/=4 drinks/day), respectively.
