Accumulation of environmental estrogens in adipose tissue of breast cancer patients

Abstract

Although the estrogenic properties of numerous chloroorganic pesticides have been widely recognized, population studies do not give clear results indicating the link between the exposure to these compounds and breast cancer development. Because of the weak affinity of these pesticides to estrogen receptors, they probably act by affecting the expression of CYP genes encoding cytochromes P450 engaged in the metabolism of environmental as well as natural estrogens. To examine the possible correlation between environmental estrogen levels in adipose tissue and breast cancer stage, grade, receptor status and onset of the disease, adipose tissue was isolated from 54 breast cancer patients and 23 healthy individuals. Clinical characteristics were obtained from the medical records, while the information concerning exposure to environmental estrogens where obtained from questionnaires. The environmental estrogens were identified and quantified by GC-chromatography. The data was analyzed with the use of Student t-test and Spearman correlation. The levels of most environmental estrogens did not differ between the patients and the controls, except the beta-HCH (beta-hexachlorocyclohexane) level, which was higher in the patients than in the healthy individuals. Significantly higher levels of DDE (1,1-bis(4-chlorophenyl)-2,2-dichloroethene) and DDT (1,1,1-trichloro-2,2-bis(4-chlorophenol)ethane) (P < 0.05) were observed in the patients with late onset of the disease which was probably due to the time of exposure. Moreover, in the patients exposed to environmental estrogens, significantly higher concentrations of DDD (1,1-bis(4-chlorophenyl)-2,2-dichloroethane) were found (P < 0.05). We also evidenced that estrogen-independent cancer was more frequent in the patients exposed to numerous risk factors in which higher levels of HCB (hexachlorobenzene), gamma-HCH (gamma-hexachlorocyclohexane), DDD and DDT in adipose tissue were detected. Breast cancer development is probably related to the accumulation of DDT and its derivatives, but the effect appears only in older patients. We postulate that environmental estrogens acting together with other risk factors might influence the progress and exacerbate the prognosis of breast cancer.

Accelerated Mammary Tumor Onset in a HER2/ Neu Mouse Model Exposed to DDT Metabolites Locally Delivered to the Mammary Gland

“…DDE concentrations and breast cancer risk. Localized delivery of p,p ´-DDE resulted in p,p ´-DDE concentrations in young and aged mice that are within the ranges detected in the human breast ( Falck et al 1992 ; Guttes et al 1998 ; Ociepa-Zawal et al 2010 ) and serum/plasma ( Cohn et al 2007 ; Eskenazi et al 2009 ; Snedeker 2001 ), as we predicted when selecting the 5-μg/pellet dose. Therefore, accelerated tumor development occurred with doses relevant to exposure in women.…”

Persistent Organic Pollutants and Breast Cancer: A Systematic Review and Critical Appraisal of the Literature

“…Of the 11,015 references retrieved by electronic search, 95 met eligibility criteria (Figure 1), of which 85 reported breast cancer incidence or prevalence outcomes [29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,41,42,43,44,45,46,47,48,49,50,51,52,53,54,55,56,57,58,59,60,61,62,63,64,65,66,67,68,69,70,71,72,73,74,75,76,77,78,79,80,81,82,83,84,85,86,87,88,89,90,91,92,93,94,95,96…”

Effects of environmental organochlorine pesticides on human breast cancer: Putative involvement on invasive cell ability

“…In our human study, results showed a relevant presence of DDT and its metabolites (Pestana et al, ). Furthermore, the compounds have been attributed carcinogenic effects, such as in breast cancer (Dich et al, ; Snedeker, ; Ociepa‐Zawal et al, ; Shakeel et al, ).…”