TY - JOUR T1 - Leucocyte telomere length, genetic variants at the <em>TERT</em> gene region and risk of pancreatic cancer JF - Gut JO - Gut SP - 1116 LP - 1122 DO - 10.1136/gutjnl-2016-312510 VL - 66 IS - 6 AU - Ying Bao AU - Jennifer Prescott AU - Chen Yuan AU - Mingfeng Zhang AU - Peter Kraft AU - Ana Babic AU - Vicente Morales-Oyarvide AU - Zhi Rong Qian AU - Julie E Buring AU - Barbara B Cochrane AU - J Michael Gaziano AU - Edward L Giovannucci AU - JoAnn E Manson AU - Kimmie Ng AU - Shuji Ogino AU - Thomas E Rohan AU - Howard D Sesso AU - Meir J Stampfer AU - Charles S Fuchs AU - Immaculata De Vivo AU - Laufey T Amundadottir AU - Brian M Wolpin Y1 - 2017/06/01 UR - http://gut.bmj.com/content/66/6/1116.abstract N2 - Objective Telomere shortening occurs as an early event in pancreatic tumorigenesis, and genetic variants at the telomerase reverse transcriptase (TERT) gene region have been associated with pancreatic cancer risk. However, it is unknown whether prediagnostic leucocyte telomere length is associated with subsequent risk of pancreatic cancer.Design We measured prediagnostic leucocyte telomere length in 386 pancreatic cancer cases and 896 matched controls from five prospective US cohorts. ORs and 95% CIs were calculated using conditional logistic regression. Matching factors included year of birth, cohort (which also matches on sex), smoking status, fasting status and month/year of blood collection. We additionally examined single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) at the TERT region in relation to pancreatic cancer risk and leucocyte telomere length using logistic and linear regression, respectively.Results Shorter prediagnostic leucocyte telomere length was associated with higher risk of pancreatic cancer (comparing extreme quintiles of telomere length, OR 1.72; 95% CI 1.07 to 2.78; ptrend=0.048). Results remained unchanged after adjustment for diabetes, body mass index and physical activity. Three SNPs at TERT (linkage disequilibrium r2&lt;0.25) were associated with pancreatic cancer risk, including rs401681 (per minor allele OR 1.33; 95% CI 1.12 to 1.59; p=0.002), rs2736100 (per minor allele OR 1.36; 95% CI 1.13 to 1.63; p=0.001) and rs2736098 (per minor allele OR 0.75; 95% CI 0.63 to 0.90; p=0.002). The minor allele for rs401681 was associated with shorter telomere length (p=0.023).Conclusions Prediagnostic leucocyte telomere length and genetic variants at the TERT gene region were associated with risk of pancreatic cancer. ER -