Meat Mutagens and Risk of Distal Colon Adenoma in a Cohort of U.S. Men
- Kana Wu1,
- Edward Giovannucci1,2,3,
- Celia Byrne5,
- Elizabeth A. Platz6,
- Charles Fuchs3,4,
- Walter C. Willett1,2,3 and
- Rashmi Sinha7
- Departments of 1Nutrition and 2Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health; 3Channing Laboratory, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School; 4Division of Medical Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts; 5Cancer Genetic and Epidemiology Program, Lombardi Cancer Center, Georgetown University, Washington, District of Columbia; 6Department of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland; and 7Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, NIH, Rockville, Maryland
- Requests for reprints:
Kana Wu, Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health, Building 2, 665 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115. Phone: 617-432-1842; Fax: 617-432-2435. E-mail: kana.wu{at}channing.harvard.edu
Abstract
Cooking meats at high temperatures and for long duration produces heterocyclic amines and other mutagens. These meat-derived mutagenic compounds have been hypothesized to increase risk of colorectal neoplasia, but prospective data are unavailable. We examined the association between intakes of the heterocyclic amines 2-amino-3,8-dimethylimidazo[4,5,-f]quinoxaline (MeIQx), 2-amino-1-methyl-6-phenylimidazo[4,5-b]pyridine (PhIP), 2-amino-3,4,8-trimethylimidazo[4,5,-f]quinoxaline (DiMeIQx), and meat-derived mutagenicity (MDM) and risk of distal colon adenoma using a cooking method questionnaire administered in 1996 in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study cohort. Between 1996 and 2002, 581 distal colon adenoma cases were identified. Higher intake of MDM was marginally associated with increased risk of distal adenoma [fourth versus lowest quintile: odds ratio (OR), 1.39; 95% confidence interval (95% CI), 1.05-1.84; highest versus lowest quintile: OR, 1.29; 95% CI, 0.97-1.72; Ptrend = 0.08]. Adjusting for total red meat or processed meat intake did not explain those associations. Our data also suggested a positive association between higher MeIQx (highest versus lowest quintile: OR, 1.28; 95% CI, 0.95-1.71; Ptrend = 0.22) and risk of adenoma, but this association was attenuated after adjusting for processed meat intake. DiMeIQx and PhIP did not seem to be associated with risk of adenoma. In conclusion, higher consumption of mutagens from meats cooked at higher temperature and longer duration may be associated with higher risk of distal colon adenoma independent of overall meat intake. Because mutagens other than heterocyclic amines also contribute to MDM, our results suggest that mutagens other than heterocyclic amines in cooked meats may also play a role in increasing the risk of distal adenoma. (Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2006;15(6):1120–5)
Footnotes
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Grant support: National Cancer Institute, NIH grants CA 55075 and CA95589.
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The costs of publication of this article were defrayed in part by the payment of page charges. This article must therefore be hereby marked advertisement in accordance with 18 U.S.C. Section 1734 solely to indicate this fact.
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- Accepted April 6, 2006.
- Received October 7, 2005.
- Revision received March 13, 2006.
