Anthropometric factors and physical activity and risk of thyroid cancer in postmenopausal women

• Published in: Cancer causes & control 2012-03, Vol.23 (3), p.421-430
• Main Authors: Kabat, Geoffrey C., Kim, Mimi Y., Thomson, Cynthia A., Luo, Juhua, Wactawski-Wende, Jean, Rohan, Thomas E.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Anthropometric measurements; Anthropometry; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Biomedicine; Body fat; Body Mass Index; Cancer; Cancer Research; Clinical trials; Confidence Intervals; Epidemiology; Exercise; Female; Health care; Hematology; Humans; Insulin; Insulin-like growth factors; Middle Aged; Motor Activity - physiology; Obesity; Oncology; Original Paper; Papillae; Papillary carcinoma; Postmenopause; Preventive medicine; Proportional Hazards Models; Prospective Studies; Public Health; Reference Values; Risk Assessment - methods; Self Report; Surveys and Questionnaires; Thyroid cancer; Thyroid Neoplasms - epidemiology; Thyroid Neoplasms - pathology; Tobacco smoking; Tumors; United States - epidemiology; Waist circumference; Women's Health; Womens health
• ISSN: 0957-5243; 1573-7225
• DOI: 10.1007/s10552-011-9890-9

Purpose To investigate the associations of anthropometric factors and physical activity with risk of thyroid cancer in a large prospective study. Methods We examined these associations with risk of incident thyroid cancer in a cohort of 144,319 postmenopausal women enrolled in the Women's Health Initiative. Cox proportional hazards models were used to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) for factors of interest with risk of all thyroid cancer (n = 294) and of the two major subtypes: papillary (n = 245) and follicular thyroid cancer (n = 32). Results After adjustment for covariates, measured height at baseline was positively associated with thyroid cancer overall (HR for highest vs. lowest quartile 1.48, 95% CI 1.04-2.13, p for trend 0.02) and with papillary carcinoma (HR 1.49, 95% CI 1.01-2.21, p for trend 0.03, respectively). For each 5 cm-increase in height, the HR for all thyroid cancer was 1.15, 95% CI 1.04-1.27 and for papillary thyroid cancer was 1.14, 95% CI 1.03-1.27. In addition, self-reported weight at age 18 was positively associated with risk of papillary thyroid cancer. In contrast, baseline weight, body mass index, waist circumference, hip circumference, waist-hip ratio, weight change from age 18 to baseline, and level of self-reported recreational physical activity were not associated with risk. Conclusions Our results suggest that attained stature is a risk factor for thyroid cancer in postmenopausal women. This association may reflect the influence of either genetic or environmental factors in early life on risk of thyroid cancer.