Gastric cancer is one of the most common causes of cancer-related mortality worldwide. The objective of this article is to review the epidemiology and biology of gastric cancer risk. This literature review explores the biological, clinical, and environmental factors that influence the rates of this disease and discuss the different intervention methods that may not only increase the awareness of gastric cancer but also increase screening in efforts to reduce the risk of gastric cancer. Helicobacter pylori infection is the primary risk factor for gastric cancer. Additional risk factors include geographical location, age, sex, smoking, socioeconomic status, dietary intake, and genetics. Primary and secondary prevention strategies such as dietary modifications and screenings are important measures for reducing the risk of gastric cancer. Interventions, such as H. pylori eradication through chemoprevention trials, have shown some potential as a preventative strategy. Although knowledge about gastric cancer risk has greatly increased, future research is warranted on the differentiation of gastric cancer epidemiology by subsite and exploring the interactions between H. pylori infection, genetics, and environmental factors. Better understanding of these relationships can help researchers determine the most effective intervention strategies for reducing the risk of this disease.

There has been marked improvement in leukemia survival, particularly among children in recent time. However, the long-term trends in survival among adult leukemia patients and the associated sex and racial survival disparities are not well understood. We, therefore, evaluated the secular trends in survival improvement of leukemia patients from 1973 through 2014, using Surveillance Epidemiology and End-Result Survey Program (SEER) data. ICD-O-3 morphology codes were used to group leukemia into four types: acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), acute myeloid leukemia (AML), chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), chronic myeloid leukemia (CML). Survival analysis for each leukemia type stratified by race/ethnicity, age, sex was performed to generate relative survival probability estimates for the baseline time period of 1973 through 1979. Hazard ratios (HR) and respective 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for survival within subsequent 10-year time periods by race, age and sex were calculated using Cox proportional hazard models. Of the 83,255 leukemia patients for the current analysis, the 5-year survival of patients with ALL, AML, CLL, and CML during 1973–1979 were 42.0%, 6.5%, 66.5%, and 20.9%, respectively. Compared to the baseline, there were substantial improvements of leukemia-specific survival in 2010–2014 among African-American (81.0%) and Asian (80.0%) patients with CML and among 20–49 year of age with CLL (96.0%). African-American patients, those with AML and those older than 75 years of age had the lowest survival improvements. Asians experienced some of the largest survival improvements during the study period. Others, including African-American and the elderly, have not benefited as much from advances in leukemia treatment.

Background Prior epidemiologic studies on the association between diabetes and gastric cancer risk provided inconclusive findings, while traditional, aggregate data meta-analyses were characterized by high betweenstudy heterogeneity.Objective To investigate the association between type 2 diabetes and gastric cancer using data from the 'Stomach Cancer Pooling (StoP) Project', an international consortium of more than 30 case-control and nested case-control studies, which is large and provides harmonized definition of participants' characteristics across individual studies. The data have the potential to minimize between-study heterogeneity and provide greater statistical power for subgroup analysis. MethodsWe included 5592 gastric cancer cases and 12 477 controls from 14 studies from Europe, Asia, North America, and South America in a two-stage individualparticipant data meta-analysis. Random-effect models were used to estimate summary odds ratios (ORs) and their corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) by pooling study-specific ORs. ResultsWe did not find an overall association between diabetes and gastric cancer (pooled OR = 1.01, 95% CI, 0.94-1.07). However, the risk of cardia gastric cancer was significantly higher among individuals with type 2 diabetes (OR = 1.16, 95% CI, 1.02-1.33). There was no association between diabetes and gastric cancer risk in strata of Helicobacter pylori infection serostatus, age, sex, BMI, smoking status, alcohol consumption, fruit/vegetable intake, gastric cancer histologic type, and source of controls.

Background. Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a commonly diagnosed subtype of cancer with a high mortality rate. One-carbon metabolism is a set of complex pathways, responsible for providing methyl group for DNA synthesis, repair and methylation. Adequate DNA methylation maintains chromosome stability and prevents gene disruption. Diet is a major source for key substrates and co-factors (i.e., vitamin B6, choline and folate) involved in one-carbon metabolism. A majority of epidemiologic studies that have evaluated one-carbon metabolism-related nutrients in relation to CRC risk have focused on the potential role of folate only. Due to the involvement of multiple nutrients and the complexity of one-carbon metabolism pathways, a comprehensive assessment of the nutrients involved and their associations with CRC risk is needed. The purpose of the current analysis was therefore to evaluate the association between one-carbon metabolism-related nutrients with the risk of developing CRC using the Singapore Chinese Health Study (SCHS). Methods. The SCHS is an on-going population-based prospective cohort study that includes 61,321 Chinese men and women in Singapore who were 45-74 years of age at baseline. A 165-item semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire was used to obtain information of dietary intake. Cox proportional hazard regression models were used to estimate the hazard ratios (HRs) and respective 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for CRC associated with one-carbon metabolism-related nutrients, including thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, vitamin B6, folate acid, vitamin B12, choline, methionine, and betaine, adjusting for potential confounders. Results. After an average of 17.5 years of follow-up, 2,140 participants developed CRC. An inverse association between folate acid and colon cancer. The HRs and respective 95% CIs for quarters 2, 3 and 4 vs. quarter 1 (the lowest quartile) was 0.98 (0.84-1.14), 0.93 (0.79-1.10) and 0.80 (0.64-0.98) (Ptrend=0.04). Similar pattern was observed between folate acid intake and colon cancer risk among never smokers (HRQ4vsQ1=0.67, 95% CI: 0.51-0.86; Ptrend=0.005). No association was found between other one-carbon metabolism-related nutrients and the risk of colorectal cancer Conclusions. In a large on-going prospective cohort study of more than 61,000 Chinese Singaporeans, we found inverse associations between dietary folate acid and the risk of colon cancer. This association was more obvious among never smokers. Our findings provide critical implication for primary prevention and control of colorectal cancer. Citation Format: Yen Thi-Hai Pham, Aizhen Jin, Renwei Wang, Woon-Puay Koh, Jian-Min Yuan, Hung N. Luu. Association between dietary one-carbon metabolism-related nutrients and the risk of colorectal cancer: Findings from the Singapore Chinese Health Study [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2023; Part 1 (Regular and Invited Abstracts); 2023 Apr 14-19; Orlando, FL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2023;83(7_Suppl):Abstract nr 6449.

High mobility group A protein-2 (HMGA2) is an architectural transcription factor that binds to the A/T-rich DNA minor groove and is responsible for regulating transcriptional activity of multiple genes indirectly through chromatin change and assembling enhanceosome. HMGA2 is overexpressed in multiple tumor types, suggesting its involvement in cancer initiation and progression, thus, making it an ideal candidate for cancer diagnostic and prognostic. We performed a systematic review to examine the role of HMGA2 as a universal tumor cancer diagnostic and prognostic marker. We used Reporting Recommendations for Tumor Marker Prognostic Studies to systematically search OvidMedline, PubMed, and the Cochrane Library for English language studies, published between 1995 and June 2019. Meta-analysis provided pooled risk estimates and their 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for an association between overall survival and recurrence of cancers for studies with available estimates. We identified 42 eligible studies with a total of 5123 tumor samples in 15 types of cancer. The pooled percentage of HMGA2 gene expression in tumor samples was 65.14%. Meta-analysis showed that cancer patients with HMGA2 positive have significantly reduced survival, compared to patients without HMGA2 gene [pooled-hazard ratio (HR) = 1.85, 95% CI 1.48–2.22]. There was a positive association between cancer patients with HMGA2 overexpression and cancer recurrence though this association did not reach significance (pooled-HR = 1.44, 95% CI 0.80–2.07). Overexpression of HMGA2 was found in 15 types of cancer. There was an association between HMGA2 overexpression with reduced survival of cancer patients. HMGA2 is thus considered a promising universal tumor marker for prognostics.