Article Text
Abstract
Objectives To characterise the association between type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) subtypes (new-onset T2DM (NODM) or long-standing T2DM (LSDM)) and pancreatic cancer (PC) risk, to explore the direction of causation through Mendelian randomisation (MR) analysis and to assess the mediation role of body mass index (BMI).
Design Information about T2DM and related factors was collected from 2018 PC cases and 1540 controls from the PanGenEU (European Study into Digestive Illnesses and Genetics) study. A subset of PC cases and controls had glycated haemoglobin, C-peptide and genotype data. Multivariate logistic regression models were applied to derive ORs and 95% CIs. T2DM and PC-related single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) were used as instrumental variables (IVs) in bidirectional MR analysis to test for two-way causal associations between PC, NODM and LSDM. Indirect and direct effects of the BMI-T2DM-PC association were further explored using mediation analysis.
Results T2DM was associated with an increased PC risk when compared with non-T2DM (OR=2.50; 95% CI: 2.05 to 3.05), the risk being greater for NODM (OR=6.39; 95% CI: 4.18 to 9.78) and insulin users (OR=3.69; 95% CI: 2.80 to 4.86). The causal association between T2DM (57-SNP IV) and PC was not statistically significant (ORLSDM=1.08, 95% CI: 0.86 to 1.29, ORNODM=1.06, 95% CI: 0.95 to 1.17). In contrast, there was a causal association between PC (40-SNP IV) and NODM (OR=2.85; 95% CI: 2.04 to 3.98), although genetic pleiotropy was present (MR-Egger: p value=0.03). Potential mediating effects of BMI (125-SNPs as IV), particularly in terms of weight loss, were evidenced on the NODM-PC association (indirect effect for BMI in previous years=0.55).
Conclusion Findings of this study do not support a causal effect of LSDM on PC, but suggest that PC causes NODM. The interplay between obesity, PC and T2DM is complex.
- pancreatic cancer
- diabetes mellitus
- obesity
- cancer epidemiology
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Footnotes
Twitter @michael_ororke
Contributors All authors meet the criteria for authorship. They have read and approved the last version of the manuscript.
Funding The work was partially supported by Fondo de Investigaciones Sanitarias (FIS), Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Spain (PI11/01542, PI0902102, PI12/01635, PI12/00815, PI15/01573); Red Temática de Investigación Cooperativa en Cáncer, Spain (RD12/0036/0034, RD12/0036/0050, RD12/0036/0073); WCR (15-0391); European Cooperation in Science and Technology - COST Action BM1204: EUPancreas. EU-6FP Integrated Project (018771-MOLDIAG-PACA), EU-FP7-HEALTH (259737- CANCERALIA, 256974-EPC-TM-Net); Associazione Italiana Ricerca sul Cancro (12182); Cancer Focus Northern Ireland and Department for Employment and Learning; and ALF (Agreement between the Swedish state and some county councils on cooperation on basic education of doctors, medical research, and the development of health care,SLL20130022), Sweden.
Competing interests None declared.
Patient and public involvement Patients and/or the public were not involved in the design, conduct, reporting or dissemination plans of this research.
Patient consent for publication Not required.
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.
Data availability statement No data are available.