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Dietary inflammatory index (DII) and risk of prostate cancer in a case–control study among Black and White US Veteran men

Prostate Cancer and Prostatic Diseases volume 22, pages 580–587 (2019)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

Background

We hypothesized a pro-inflammatory diet would be associated with higher prostate cancer (PC) risk.

Methods

We prospectively recruited incident PC cases (n = 254) and controls (n = 328) at the Durham Veteran Affairs, from 2007 to 2018. From a self-completed 61-item Food Frequency Questionnaire, we calculated dietary inflammatory index (DII®) scores with and without supplements. We examined the association between DII scores with and without supplements and overall PC risk using logistic regression and risk of low-grade PC (grade group 1) and high-grade PC (grade group 2–5) with multinomial logistic regression.

Results

Cases were more likely to be Black (58 vs. 42%), had higher PSA (6.4 vs. 0.8 ng/ml), lower BMI (29.1 vs. 30.6 kg/m2) and were older (64 vs. 62 years) versus controls (all p < 0.01). Both black controls and cases had higher DII scores with and without supplements, though the DII scores with supplements in controls was not significant. On multivariable analysis, there were no associations between DII with or without supplements and overall PC risk (p-trend = 0.14, p-trend = 0.09, respectively) or low-grade PC (p-trend = 0.72, p-trend = 0.47, respectively). Higher DII scores with (p-trend = 0.04) and without supplements (p = 0.08) were associated with high-grade PC, though the association for DII without supplements was not significant.

Conclusions

A pro-inflammatory diet was more common among Black men and associated with high-grade PC in our case–control study. The degree to which a pro-inflammatory diet contributes to PC race disparities warrants further study. If confirmed, studies should test whether a low-inflammatory diet can prevent high-grade PC, particularly among Black men.

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Funding

This study was supported by the National Institutes of Health (grant number: K24 CA160653) and Department of Defense Award (DOD W81XWH-16-1-0750). ACV was supported by a Research Scholar Grant, RSG-18-018-01- CPHPS, from the American Cancer Society.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Surgery, Division of Urology, Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Adriana C. Vidal & Stephen J. Freedland

  2. Duke Cancer Institute, Durham, NC, USA

    Taofik Oyekunle & Lauren E. Howard

  3. Surgery Section, Durham VA Medical Center, Durham, NC, USA

    Taofik Oyekunle, Lauren E. Howard, Amanda De Hoedt & Stephen J. Freedland

  4. Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, NC, USA

    Lauren E. Howard

  5. Cancer Prevention and Control Program, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA

    Nitin Shivappa & James R. Hebert

  6. Department of Medicine, Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Jane C. Figueiredo

  7. Institute for Translational Epidemiology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA

    Emanuela Taioli

  8. Department of Preventive Medicine, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, TN, USA

    Jay H. Fowke

  9. Department of Medicine, Division of Nephrology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, USA

    Pao-Hwa Lin

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  1. Adriana C. Vidal
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Adriana C. Vidal.

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Conflict of interest

JRH owns controlling interest in Connecting Health Innovations LLC (CHI), a company planning to license the right to his invention of the dietary inflammatory index (DII®) from the University of South Carolina in order to develop computer and smart phone applications for patient counseling and dietary intervention in clinical settings. NS is an employee of CHI. The subject matter of this paper will not have any direct bearing on the activities of CHI, nor has CHI exerted any influence on this project. The other authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Vidal, A.C., Oyekunle, T., Howard, L.E. et al. Dietary inflammatory index (DII) and risk of prostate cancer in a case–control study among Black and White US Veteran men. Prostate Cancer Prostatic Dis 22, 580–587 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41391-019-0143-4

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