Alcohol intake is associated with prostate cancer risk

Many previous studies have confirmed that alcohol is associated with prostate cancer, and the causal relationship is becoming clear However, there is no clear biological explanation or evidence for how alcohol causes prostate cancer In recent studies, when we explore the relationship between alcohol and disease, we found that the stratification error of drinkers and the quality of research will have a great influence on the conclusion The relationship between alcohol and prostate cancer requires the final decision of the international agency for cancer research (IARC) In 1988, IARC first declared alcohol a carcinogen But some of IARC's judgments about specific cancers are based on epidemiological and basic research results Recently, BMC cancer published a me ta-analysis (http:// adding new evidence to the relationship between alcohol intake and prostate cancer risk This study will help to further understand the risks of alcohol and cancer The researchers searched PubMed and web of science for case-control and cohort studies related to alcohol intake and prostate cancer incidence / death, with a deadline of November 2014 In this study, 27 documents were selected from 340 documents Based on the level control of selection bias and confounding factors, a mixed model was used to assess the relative risk of alcohol to prostate cancer incidence rate or mortality (RR) Of the 27 studies, 16 had a history bias and 15 had a frequency bias Only 6 items had no more than two biases The total alcohol intake and frequency in the study were assessed for at least one week The study found that the risk of prostate cancer was significantly higher in the small (RR = 1.08), medium (RR = 1.07), large (RR = 1.14) and very large (RR = 1.18) alcohol drinkers than in the abstainers There was a dose-response relationship among the drinkers In the study, the alcohol content was calculated in grams The alcohol content of 2 cups / day is 1.30-24 g; 4 cups / day is 25-44 g; 6 cups / day is 25-64 g; more than 6 cups / day is > 65 G Compared with lifetime abstainers, the risk of prostate cancer was 8% (RR = 1.08) higher in a small amount of drinkers (2 cups / day); 7% (RR = 1.07) higher in a medium amount of drinkers (4 cups / day); 14% (RR = 1.14) higher in a large amount of drinkers (6 cups / day); 18% (RR = 1.18) higher in a large amount of drinkers (≥ 6 cups / day) The risk assessment was higher in the six studies without bias and classification error For example, in these six studies, a small number of drinkers had a 23% higher risk of prostate cancer than abstainers (RR = 1.23) For the first time, a significant dose-response relationship was found between low alcohol intake and prostate cancer risk This relationship is stronger than that of some former drinkers and no classification errors Therefore, alcohol intake is likely to be one of the risk factors for prostate cancer But the researchers only reported on the total amount of alcohol consumed this time Studies based on the consumption of a particular alcohol, such as red wine, whiskey, vodka, sake or other spirits, were excluded Due to the high prevalence of prostate cancer in developed countries, the impact of the findings on public health (http:// is significant Prostate cancer may be taken seriously in the future along with other cancers (breast, colon, liver and esophageal), so as to integrate public health strategies and reduce alcohol-related diseases